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THE VISION OF A 
SHORT LIFE 

a jttemotial 

OF 

WARREN BARTLETT SEABURY 

ONE OF THE FOUNDERS OF THE YALE 
MISSION COLLEGE IN CHINA 

"7 was not disobedient unto the Heavenly Vision" 
BY HIS FATHER 

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CAMBRIDGE 

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1909 






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TO 

HIS CLASSMATES AT YALE 

AND 

HIS FELLOW-WORKERS 

IN CHINA 



" Warren Seabury was a man of vision. When a 
youth he had the vision to see that the world and every- 
body in it needed the religion of Jesus Christ. He had 
the vision to realize especially what Christianity could 
do for China. He had the vision to see a small col- 
legiate school developing there into a university, con- 
ducted by men who had had the experience of Yale 
life and work. He had the vision to see what such an 
institution could do in the building up of China. He 
saw how his talents, such as they were, could be sac- 
rificed to that service. Warren Seabury left Yale with 
a vision which was doubtless nurtured early in the 
home life" 

Rev. Anson Phelps Stokes, Jr. 

At the Memorial Service. 



INTRODUCTORY 

The life of one who has spent a score of years in 
preparation for his calling and has garnered but a 
handful of sheaves from early sowing when suddenly 
summoned to the harvesting, should be set forth 
with brevity and self-restraint. This is especially true 
of one so modest and retiring as the subject of this 
sketch, which is made up in part of his letters to the 
home circle during his student days and his three 
years' residence in China. 

From the first the writer has kept in mind that 
noble army of young men just entering their life's 
work and asking themselves the question, " What do 
my talents, my education, the age to which I belong 
demand of me?" May students in China, also, find 
in these pages evidences of that entire devotion to 
their good which crowned Warren Seabury's life. 
As far as possible the personal element has been 
eliminated from this biography. In preparing it the 
writer does not act upon his own initiative, but yields 
to the request of friends, particularly the Executive 
Committee of the Yale Mission, who believe that the 
story of the founding of the New Yale in China can- 
not be fully told without tracing in its early stages 
the labors of this young Volunteer. 



viii INTRODUCTORY 

May this memorial of a beloved son, resolute, 
responsive to every righteous appeal, tireless in 
energy, genial of soul, unspoiled by praise, ever open 
to new Visions of Truth, extend his influence and 
prolong his life so early cut off. 

J. B. S. 

Wellesley Hills, Mass. 



CONTENTS 

I. Ancestry and Early Years ... 1 

II. A Year at Hotchkiss 8 

III. Life at Yale 14 

IV. Hartford Seminary 29 

V. The Call to China — The Journey 

Out 45 

VI. The Winter at Hankow .... 59 
VII. Changsha — The Year of Beginnings 79 
VIII. The Founding of the Yale Mission 

College 116 

IX. Living in the Life of Others . .131 

X. Ruling 146 

XI. The Accident 165 

XII. The Memorial Service 177 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

Warren Bartlett Seabury Frontispiece 

From a photograph taken in 1904 

Warren at twenty-one months 8 

In his room, Theological Seminary, Hartford, 
Conn 30 

The old fireplace in Mr. Stokes's house, New 
Haven, Conn 46 

Seabury and Gage starting on one of their quests 
for land for Yale Mission College .... 88 

After the Banquet at the Governor's official resi- 
dence, Chang sha, Hunan 102 

His Excellency, Tuan Fang, in the centre 

Front Gate of Yale Mission College, Changsha, 
"Great Ya-li College" {Translation of inscrip- 
tion over the door) 118 

The Guest Hall, Yale Mission College . . . 124 

Chinese Teachers 128 

Dr. Niu : Dean, left 

Mr. Ts'ai : Chinese Classics, centre 

Mr. Kao : Science, right 



xfi ILLUSTRATIONS 

Faculty of the College in the Chapel opening 
day, Nov. 16, 1906 140 

Seabury and Hoyt in native dress 148 

Yale Mission College : Teachers and Students, 

May, 1907 154 

Professor H. P. Beach, Yale University, in 
the centre 

Ruling in the Mountains 160 

Yale Bungalow on extreme right 

Cemetery at Ruling 174 

Arthur Mann's grave on the left 
Warren Seabury's grave on the right 



THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 



THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

i 

ANCESTRY AND EARLY YEARS 

The story has come down to us that one spring 
morning about the year 1729 a boy, then in his early 
teens, was riding horseback from Ipswich to Tops- 
field, Massachusetts, carrying nails in his saddlebags 
for use in building his father's barn. Suddenly he 
was confronted by a highwayman who, hearing the 
jingling of the nails and thinking they were silver 
dollars, ordered him to halt. The quick wit of this 
country lad caught his crafty intent, and with a swift 
swing of his right arm he hurled his saddlebags over 
a stone wall, nails and all. The robber, instantly 
dismounting, sprang for his booty, while the boy, 
seeing that the thief had a better horse than he, 
mounted the fleeter animal and made a bold dash 
for the Topsfield farm. The sequel of this exciting 
adventure marks a crisis in his life. In the highway- 
man's saddlebags this boy, Ivory Hovey by name, 
found a goodly sum of money, with which he was 
enabled to carry out a long-cherished ambition for 
an education. He entered Harvard College in 1731, 
graduating with honor in 1735, a college-mate of 



2 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Samuel Phillips, father of the projector and prin- 
cipal founder of Phillips Andover Academy and an- 
cestor of Phillips Brooks ; classmate of John Phillips, 
founder of Phillips Exeter Academy. 

In two pastorates of almost equal length, one at 
Mattapoisett, the other at South Plymouth, Ivory 
Hovey adorned the Christian ministry by a scholarly 
and useful service of sixty-five years. He was a man 
of chivalrous spirit, giving his three sons to the War 
for Independence; a daughter married a colonel in 
the army, enduring with him the hardships of that 
desperate struggle. He preached to the last, and died 
November 4, 1803, in his ninetieth year. 

The subject of this sketch was a direct descendant 
of this resourceful and stout-hearted parson, in the 
fifth generation, and was born in Lowell, Massachu- 
setts, September 17, 1877. 

It is on record that, as early as the year 1639, three 
men were living in eastern Massachusetts, typical 
New Englanders, — John Warren of Watertown, 
Robert Bartlett of Plymouth, John Seabury of Bos- 
ton, whose sons, down to the seventh generation, 
have won for themselves an honorable name, as the 
annals of the Old Colony, the heroism of Bunker Hill, 
and high attainments in the learned professions 
amply attest. Being a direct descendant of these men, 
whose memory is revered in the family, the boy re- 
ceived the name of Warren Bartlett Seabury. 



ANCESTRY AND EARLY YEARS 3 

His first complete sentence was "I see," and to 
vision his life was largely given. These two words 
point to a well-rounded manhood, whose vision of 
friendship, duty, truth he ever aimed to realize. There 
was an unconscious foregleam of his future in a re- 
mark made by an intelligent and attractive Chinese, 
who was accustomed to call at the Lowell home: 
"Warren, some day you will go to China and teach 
my countrymen about Jesus Christ." 

When he was seven months old he was baptized, 
as the family journal says: "consecrated to the 
service of God." When he was nine months old, his 
sister, Helena, eighteen months older than he, was 
taken seriously ill; the disease attacked him also, 
and both children seemed for a time to hover between 
life and death. She was taken, but he was spared : 
" Warren has come back to us from the very Gate of 
Heaven, restored by God's most Holy Will." 

He was a child of normal powers, of good balance, 
of average promise. A certain seriousness of mind, 
thoughtfulness, reflectiveness, early appeared in him, 
the basis of rapid development in later years. To one 
as active as he, and as ready to receive moral im- 
pressions, well-doing became in a measure easier than 
to many boys. Obedience was rarely compulsory; 
it was spontaneous. Young as he was when he be- 
gan to manifest this spirit, he never betrayed the 
least artificiality in possessing it. From boyhood up, 



4 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

what his play, his student life, his life-work demanded 
that he appear to be, he was. To all high ideals kept 
before him in the home he made ready and earnest 
response. There was apparent in him as a boy a 
quality which appeared in later life. As a friend in 
Hankow has written: "The characteristic that im- 
pressed us most was his faithfulness. He seldom 
came to Hankow; it was always, 'Seabury says he 
can't leave just now, he's just getting hold of the 
language,' or, * Seabury thinks he has some boys 
fixed for the school and they might drift away if he 
came down.' Then there was the work for the relief 
of the Hunan flood sufferers, in which he was one of 
the leaders, — faithful and efficient, forgetful of self 
and pitiful of suffering." 

Like many other children of a contemplative 
turn of mind, he occasionally practised the art of 
"preaching," and one Sabbath, after listening to Rev. 
Dr. Meredith, and being kindled by a spark from 
his fiery anvil, he gathered the family together and 
gave them a sermon on his own account, from the 
words " God is love." Other parts of the service were 
carried through in proper order and with due respect 
to the occasion. One day his religious fervor burst 
forth in these words : " I feel so happy I don't know 
what to do. I love God so dearly, I feel just like pray- 
ing;" and he did pray, again and again. 

Warren at six years of age seemed to have a sudden 



ANCESTRY AND EARLY YEARS 5 

vision of God, a boyish insight into things spiritual. 
During his father's absence in Palestine, he asked : 
" Did papa take off his shoes when he went into the 
Holy Land ? " and, watching the motley crowd of 
people passing the house where he lived, he said : 
" It seems strange that all the ragged people and the 
black people and the coal men have been in God's 
hands." His early leanings towards moral and re- 
ligious things in no way suppressed in him the finest 
physical self-expression, the most intense ardor in all 
boyish sports, roguery, a wholesome love of plea- 
santry. There was in him at that early age a prophetic 
blending of sturdy conscientiousness with a full, free, 
exuberant enjoyment of life. The man was beginning 
to crop out in the boy. 

It was Warren's good fortune to spend the forma- 
tive years of his life, from eight to eighteen, in Ded- 
ham, Massachusetts, a New England town of the 
historic type. Powder Rock, the Pillar of Liberty, 
the Training-Field of the Revolution, the Old Fair- 
banks House, and similar relics of the graphic past, 
were silently moulding his character. He canoed on 
the Charles, roamed the wooded slopes of Wilson's 
Mountain, gathered chestnuts on Federal Hill. He 
early showed a fondness for mechanics, wrought good 
specimens of work with his lathe, which he purchased 
with money he had himself earned, installed a tele- 
phone between his room and that of a boy friend in 



6 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the neighborhood. There was a martial note in the 
original design he drew to express his loyalty to his 
mother, — on the right a sword, on the left bow and 
arrows, in the centre a Cross, heavily pencilled, 
against which stood out the words he wished her es- 
pecially to mark : " Obedience. Honor. Chivalry. 
Love." Of all the games Warren played in boy- 
hood, and ever after, none quite equalled base-ball. 
To his thinking it was, par excellence, the American 
game for American youth. Through his college 
course and in the Seminary, base-ball took the lead 
among his chosen pastimes. 

His fondness for his home friends was very deep 
and ardent. Not only toward his parents, but toward 
each of his brothers, Joseph, Mason, and Mortimer, 
and his sister, Katherine, his heart ever went out in the 
most tender affection. Nothing could be more clearly 
proved than this by reading his home letters from 
College, Seminary, and his field of labor in China. 

He spent six years at the Ames Grammar School. 
Mr. J. H. Burdett, the principal, writes: "Warren 
was rather reserved, friendly to all, as is becoming in 
the democracy of a public school. I well remember 
his uniform bearing of modest self-respect and cour- 
tesy/ He was instinctively a gentleman. I try to recall 
him as he appeared to me sixteen years ago, and not 
allow my picture of him to be clouded by my know- 
ledge of his devotion to high ideals and Christian 



ANCESTRY AND EARLY YEARS 7 

heroism so conspicuous in his manhood." He took 
the full course at the High School under Mr. George 
F. Joyce, Jr., graduating in 1895. 

Warren had at times expressed a desire to unite 
with the church ; his delay in taking this step accorded 
with his temperament and his deliberate manner of 
weighing well all important questions. In his decision 
to devote himself to the service of God, as a minister 
of the Gospel, his resolve to make public profession 
of religion crystallized. On the first Sabbath in July, 
1895, he, with twenty-five others, mostly young peo- 
ple, joined the First Congregational Church of Ded- 
ham, and of that church he remained a member to the 
close of his life. 



II 

A YEAR AT HOTCHKISS 

Upon graduation from the High School, Warren 
passed his preliminaries for admission to Yale, but it 
was thought an advantage to give him a year in some 
good fitting school. Hotchkiss, at Lakeville, Con- 
necticut, was chosen, and it was his good fortune to 
come under the thorough instruction and refining in- 
fluence of that virile friend of boys, Edward G. Coy. 

No event in a boy's life so tests his character as 
when he begins life in an academy away from home. 
To a positive, aggressive nature it brings an oppor- 
tunity for leadership; to a boy of unassuming dis- 
position it demands a reenforcement of decision, 
manliness, courage. Warren's happy art of making 
friends helped him to win his way into many hearts 
at Hotchkiss, but fully to adapt himself to his new 
surroundings required an exercise of will. He shrank 
from self-imposed prominence; he preferred to be 
sought after rather than to court favor. There was 
something noticeable in the way he carried himself, — 
open to receive impressions from others, very guarded 
in admitting others into the inner chamber of his 
heart. As a result he chose his friends cautiously and 
with discriminating reserve. 



b 




i 



A YEAR AT HOTCHKISS 9 

In the direction of athletics, especially foot-ball, 
Warren developed a healthy ambition, but, having 
received an accident to his knee, he was kept back by 
parental warnings. " You are very, very kind to me. 
May this introductory sentence prepare you for the 

next (you know me), I want to play f b . 

When I get to Yale, whose Freshman class will be 
bigger than the whole school here, I won't get a 
chance to play at all, not through my whole college 
course. Of course I shall do as you say, but I hope 
you will say — what I want you to." He accepted a 
negative answer with that earnest deference to pa- 
rental choice which always marked his conduct. 

The studies of this single year at a preparatory 
school were directed to the final test for admission 
to college, and were in a measure review work. He 
took an honorable stand in all of them, but made his 
best record in English. " I am anxious to get an honor 
in some study ; I hope it may be in English, where I 
often get ' A.' My instructor in that department says 
my standing is high enough to warrant one. ... I 
am very busy ; besides twenty-one hours a week in the 
recitation room, I have glee club five times a week, 
gymnasium an hour each day, Latin at sight two 
evenings a week, debating once a week with duties 
as secretary of that Society, treasurer of the Pythian, 
and library work." 

No record of those days at Hotchkiss would be 



10 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

complete without reference to the deepening of his 
religious life. He thought much upon problems older 
heads than his have found it impossible to solve. 
And yet he made his modest attempt at a solution : 
"I understand the Trinity better than I used to. 
It seems to me something like this, — God sent his 
Spirit into the world, first through a man whom He 
called * My son.' Jesus Christ was born like any other 
person, but was filled with the Spirit of God, so that 
He was on this earth God in the flesh. He was sinless, 
but being a man He came to meet and overcome temp- 
tation. (Note. It is possible for us to become Christ- 
like, if we overcome the temptations of life.) After 
God had sent His Spirit into the world in visible 
form for the short space of thirty-three years, and 
after men had seen a perfect life which they might 
copy, He withdrew His son. Then He sent the Holy 
Spirit, Who takes possession of every one in propor- 
tion as he has the heart to receive Him. Christ was 
a man of like passions with ourselves, and yet He was 
the Son of God. How can I reconcile that with the 
fact that He was with God before the world was? 
Yet they need not necessarily conflict, for Christ 
could have come down to earth, taken the form of a 
child, and filled the body as He grew to manhood. 

Mr. B says there is a time when young men 

think they are very wise, when their simple, child- 
hood faith gives way to broader views of life. I hope 



A YEAR AT HOTCHKISS 11 

to pass that stage in perfect safety. Its influence I 
begin to feel." In the same vein of reflection he wrote 
a little later : " It is much easier for me to see the rea- 
sons for serving Christ than it is for me to realize in 
my heart that God is everywhere, although I have 
mental proof of that fact and also that He is attentive 
to my prayers. But I am praying for ability to see 
more clearly what I really desire. I don't know what 
' animating Presence ' is, but I think that God is that 
Divine Something which has got hold of the world and 
enters every Christian heart. Conscience is a quality 
of the Divine Spirit." 

Warren seldom referred to his own spiritual ex- 
perience, feeling it was one of those things that can- 
not be exposed to the view of any one. These words 
were rarely duplicated in his correspondence with the 
home circle: "I have been thinking of my own 
Christian life. I believe it will strengthen my faith 
and be advantageous to me in every way to do active 
work for Christ. I have a feeling that such work will 
help me to be a better Christian and to come into 
sympathy with Him. I must make my college life, 
now so near at hand, doubly profitable, once for the 
home friends and once for myself. I thank God 
that in pleasing my earthly parents I am pleasing 
Him." 

Warren's religious life developed normally, grow- 
ing into a serene faith and at times into an exuberant 



12 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

joy. And yet the tide was not always at the full : " I 
have made several good resolves of late, but I think 
it is better not to speak of them, but to show what 
they are by their results." In the following he admits 
an experience unknown to him before, nor did he 
ever use the depressing words again : " I am almost 
discouraged, and yet I cannot explain it. I feel doubt- 
ful about religion. I don't know what to do. I must 
remember that religion is not emotional. I almost 
feel that in what I have been writing there were 
things which I could not have fully realized or things 
in which I was deceived. Don't mind what I say. 
I shall be all right soon. At any rate it will do me 
good to get home once more. I hope to get into 
college without a condition but am afraid of being 
over-confident." In this case at least his habit of 
underestimating his ability was not well founded. 
He passed all his examinations for admission to Yale 
without conditions. 

The instructors and students of Hotchkiss School 
followed Warren to his new work in China. His name 
was kept before them by speakers from outside, and 
there were many references to his labors in China 
during the Missionary Conference at the School in 
1907. To centralize this interest and give it perma- 
nent form, a tablet is about to be erected in one of 
the Yale Mission buildings at Changsha, bearing the 
following inscription : — 



A YEAR AT HOTCHKISS 13 

IN LOVING MEMORY 
OF 

THE REVEREND WARREN BARTLETT SEABURY, B.A. 

A FOUNDER OF THIS COLLEGE 

BORN SEPTEMBER 17, 1877, DROWNED AT RULING, JULY 29, 1907 

THIS TABLET IS ERECTED 

BY THE 

HOTCHKISS SCHOOL 

OF WHICH HE WAS ONCE A MEMBER 

He walked with God and he was not 
for God took him 



Ill 

LIFE AT YALE 

" All is well ! I am a Yale student in full standing J 
Please send my bond." The bond under seal, soon 
in Warren's hands, suggests a "bond" of a more 
personal kind, and more enduring, between himself 
and the college of his choice. It was destined to hold 
him to her as with bands of steel, to mould his char- 
acter and give it structure, to shape his life's work and 
give it concreteness. It was " a bond under seal " to 
the Almighty for service in China. 

The first of his family to enter Yale, he threw him- 
self into her contagious activities. He quickly re- 
sponded to her bracing " spirit." Although of a sen- 
sitive temperament, he had withal a good measure 
of self-reliance, force of will, discrimination in matters 
of personal justice, a fine passion against defenceless 
abuse; he had the qualities which call out respect 
among his associates. His year at Hotchkiss had 
given him a circle of acquaintances exceedingly help- 
ful in establishing him in the student life of the Uni- 
versity. That he early caught her atmosphere appears 
in a letter of his, published in the Dedham "High 
School Bulletin," soon after the opening of Fresh- 
man year : " Yale is preeminently a college of customs. 



LIFE AT YALE 15 

The Freshmen are not permitted to sit on the fence 
in the Campus unless their nine wins the base-ball 
game with the Harvard Freshmen ; nor can they pass 
ball nor spin top on the Campus (!). This * privilege ' 
is reserved for Seniors. Only Seniors can bow to the 
President as he passes down the middle aisle at 
Chapel. Although athletics are interesting to all the 
students, they are not predominant over the intellec- 
tual side of Yale life, as outsiders sometimes claim 
they are." 

Soon after the opening of college Dean H. P. 
Wright gave the customary address to the Freshman 
class; his subject, "Privileges and Duties of Stu- 
dents," with its fourfold division, " Character, Honor, 
Privilege, Example," furnishing Warren a motto for 
his course at Yale. During Freshman year he roomed 
in Lake Place, at the house of Dr. E. F. Mcintosh ; 
during Sophomore and Junior years at 272 Law- 
rance Hall. 

In the summer of 1897, at the close of Freshman 
year, Warren travelled in Europe with his cousin, 
M. Phillips Mason, a Junior at Harvard. They 
visited Paris, did a good deal in Switzerland, saw the 
beauties of the Rhine, looked into Western Germany, 
toured Holland and a little of Southern England. Writ- 
ing of the trip, Mr. Mason says : " Warren had two 
qualities which are invaluable when travelling with 
others ; he was always good-natured, ready to under- 



16 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

take anything, and he had a deep sense of humor. 
He seemed to enjoy people, on the whole, more than 
places. He was always having his fun with the va- 
rious persons whom we happened to meet, and did 
love to have his little talks with them to see what they 
were made of. While we were in London we went to 
service in Westminster Abbey . Canon Gore preached ; 
his text was from one of the verses in the story of the 
Pharisee and the Publican, and he very effectively in- 
veighed against self-satisfaction and exclusiveness. He 
came close to his audience, and his manner was ex- 
tremely informal. We both felt that it was one of the 
finest sermons we had ever heard. But Warren re- 
marked that the formality of the English service did 
not seem to him in keeping with the directness of Canon 
Gore. This illustrates not only his dislike for formality 
in religious worship, but his good sense of the fitness 
of things." 

More recently Mr. Mason wrote : " On one of the 
last drives we took together, I remember Warren's 
telling me that he thought the main thing that made 
life worth living was to live for some high ideal. I 
think he felt most at home in an intellectual and 
spiritual environment, but his real ideal was to bring 
about something of an architectonic nature. He was 
primarily executive." 

Warren's candor and ingenuousness lacked nothing 
in their claim on his fellows; he was never tempted 



LIFE AT YALE 17 

to be other than perfectly transparent. Various 
forces contributed to develop his Christian life. One 
of these was the college pulpit. It was his habit to 
give in his weekly home letter a digest of the sermon 
of the previous Sunday. He wrote of his enjoyment 
in listening to Dr. Alexander McKenzie, whose 
definition of a Christian he long remembered and 
quoted : " A Christian is one who does for Christ's 
sake what he would not do otherwise." 

Of President Stryker of Hamilton he writes : " He 
uses forcible language, and some of his bursts of 
eloquence would seem out of place from one who 
spoke less spontaneously than he. One secret of his 
power lay in his naturalness and ease." He was im- 
pressed by the ornate diction of Dr. Henry van 
Dyke, the evangelical fervor of Dr. Burrell, the prac- 
tical weight of Dr. Teunis Hamlin, the logical acumen 
and Saxon clarity of Dr. Jefferson. Stirred by a 
powerful discourse by Dr. Bradford, he hastened 
to record his feelings : " I have been thinking that a 
minister does very little good who does not preach 
fundamental truths. While listening to such a man 
as he, one feels the love of God, the power of God, 
and something of His eternal verities. I sometimes 
think we talk too much and think too little." Later 
in his course he writes of the services in Battell 
Chapel in a more appreciative way still: "I don't 
know what I should do without the divine stim- 



18 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

ulus of hearing God's Word preached, and being in 
a religious atmosphere; I am praying for guidance 
and the soul to follow God closely in my life's 
work." 

The field for mission work in New Haven is a wide 
one. As in the case of many other students Warren 
went into it heartily, believing it would have its bear- 
ing on his future, as a Christian worker. After an 
evening at the East Street Mission he described in his 
home letter the arrangements of the building and the 
atmosphere of the room, " filled with college men and 
tramps." When testimonies were called for, two men 
arose to show their desire to live better lives : " The 
leader told them that if they wanted to follow Christ 
they could not have lodgings in that house that night. 
* Which will you choose ? ' said the leader. They both 
gave up the lodgings." This frontier-like method 
of putting an untutored inquirer to the test did not 
commend itself to Warren's common sense. But his 
open-mindedness towards any methods by which a 
man may be reached led him to review the subject 
thoughtfully and make a personal application to his 
own life : " I don't think I myself have learned some 
important truths yet. I wish that the desire for work 
which I feel in a meeting like this burned in my heart 
all the time. May God give me an earnest enthusi- 
asm in His service this week." 

The religious life at Yale was sometimes quickened 



LIFE AT YALE 19 

by the coming of preachers or evangelists of note, 
selected for their power over young men. In Warren's 
Junior year George Adam Smith and Dwight L. 
Moody held special services at the College: " Moody 
preached with his usual frankness and straightfor- 
wardness on 'sowing and reaping.' After speaking 
for half an hour he asked those who could do so to 
remain longer, and many stayed. Then he asked if 
any had the courage to say they wanted the gift of 
eternal life. There was a pause; then I tried to count 
the voices of those who said ' I have,' or an equiva- 
lent, but could not keep track of them. Over one 
hundred followed him downstairs, while a large num- 
ber of Christians remained above to pray. We have 
been praying for ten days that Moody and Smith 
might have power to move men's hearts. May God 
forgive us for doubting that He would answer our 
prayers, and for being surprised when He did answer 
them to-night. We are very thankful for the work 
done by glorious Mr. Moody. We look for a decided 
spiritual atmosphere here at Yale. We have a list 
of twenty men in our class who have responded to his 
direct appeals to enter the Christian life. It has 
always seemed to me that the great feature of the 
Christian life was a deep, animating, changeless, 
spiritual energy, — something which never seemed 
to be my possession. If I were not wrong in trusting 
so much to feeling, and if I were not deceived by a 



20 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

temporary enthusiasm, I should think I was drawing 
nearer." 

The growth of Warren's Christian life was marked 
from the outset by a healthful virility. Imbedded in 
a deep religious instinct, it broadened sanely into 
an every -day life in God. There was no feverish 
straining after a stereotyped form of godliness, but 
the unfolding of a man's inner self, with God as its 
Soul and Being. He believed that Dwight Hall, as a 
centre for the activities of Christian men, was a dis- 
tinct localization and development of the spiritual 
aspirations of students. It quite fitted into his own 
needs as expressed early in his course : " I think my 
Christian life is somewhat dependent upon my sur- 
roundings. I must be in close alliance with others in 
order to feel enthusiastic." 

It would be setting up a false standard were we to 
judge of Warren's character by his religious aspira- 
tions alone. No student could have a more rational 
view of the whole range of college life than he. He was 
extremely fond of athletics, and believed they were 
necessary to a well-proportioned manhood. His de- 
light in returning to the track, after an obstinate 
handicap of two years caused by an injured knee, was 
very keen : " I have been running nearly all the fall, 
in preparation for the autumn contests. They took 
place yesterday and I am the happy possessor of two 
shining cups, one for second in the one-hundred-yard 



LIFE AT YALE 21 

dash and one for first in the two-twenty. It was a 
source of genuine satisfaction to me, but I had to run 
all the way. As a result I was given a big dinner at 
the best restaurant in the city." Writing later on the 
same subject, he says : " The class games took place 
yesterday. I was not successful. It is a sort of belief 
of mine that there is a law of compensation among 
men ; that if one cannot excel in one direction, he can 
in another. It only remains for him to find out what 
that direction is." 

The shaping of Warren's future calling began to 
appear near the close of his Junior year. His letters 
of this period were especially thoughtful and specific 
in their references to his place in God's kingdom. 
About this time he, with thirty others, who were 
"supposedly thinking about entering the ministry," 
was invited to spend an evening at the house of Presi- 
dent D wight. To be in such a company showed that 
he was ready to be classed among those who were 
looking toward that profession. In the same letter 
he quietly remarks : " I have had quite a long talk 
with Arthur B. Williams, Jr., of the Yale Missionary 
Band." Thus it appeared that the seed had begun to 
germinate. Theology and missions were filling the 
horizon of his future. He had succeeded in getting 
many of his student friends to go with him to North- 
field that summer. As the meetings advanced, the 
ploughshare struck into the deepest depths of his 



22 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

soul. It brought light, conviction, decision. "The 
meetings lack nothing of their consummate power;" 
and of that " power " Warren partook in abundant 
measure. When he returned home he beckoned to 
his mother and father to come into a room by them- 
selves, and there he told the story in a single sentence : 
" I have made up my mind to be a missionary.'' The 
light of a joyous hope was on his face, the assurance 
that he had done his full duty. 

And yet that characteristic of his, to weigh well 
any step he was inclined to take, led him to write, on 
his return to college : " I want to consider with you the 
question of signing the Volunteer Card. If I decide to 
sign, I want to do it before I graduate, both for my 
own good and for the good of those about me. This 
is my last year and oh ! the thoughts that come when 
I reflect upon that fact ! I will not let this fire go out 
if, by God's grace, it is possible to keep it burning." 
And again a little later : " During this Senior year I 
am trying to live. There is so much that I have not 
done, the danger is I will not do it in this my last 
chance. The fact is I don't know just where to begin." 
The significance of such a step seemed to him so 
weighty that he held it in a state of suspense until 
March 1, 1900, when he writes, " I signed the Volun- 
teer Card yesterday. You know this is no sudden 
decision of mine. I have been thinking of it for a 
long time. Of late special influence has been brought 



LIFE AT YALE 23 

to bear upon me through my friend, Brewer Eddy, 
and others. I have looked at the matter from every 
side, and while I do not claim to appreciate this step 
fully, I feel I have been divinely guided and do not 
fear self-accusation for over-hastiness. I am weak, 
but pray for increasing strength every day. I. H. N." 
Nothing could indicate more clearly the prudence, 
the caution, the deliberateness of Warren's manner 
of coming to a crisis in life than this. The decision 
was made for all time ; nothing could turn him from it. 
The week following brought to Yale the two men 
who of all others were fitted for such a critical epoch 
in his life, Mott and Speer. " Mott's work," writes the 
new volunteer, "has been marked with power from 
the beginning. Not only has he reached unusually 
large audiences by his clear argument, solemn ear- 
nestness and conviction, but he has devoted a large 
portion of his time to personal interviews with men. In 
this way he met in the neighborhood of forty students 
who desired advice. We who had been praying and 
working for the meetings, were deeply stirred by 
seeing the number and quality of the fellows not only 
attending the meetings but staying to know more per- 
fectly of * this way.' It was our special duty to get men 
to come, men who needed such influence, and to talk 
with them afterwards. Speer spoke to a full house 
last Friday evening. Robert E. Speer is a vision of 
God." 



24 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Another force that was at work to strengthen him in 
his recent decision was the Ecumenical Missionary 
Conference in New York, April, 1900, which he calls 
"a fine monument to the power of the Gospel of 
Christ. I am glad I attended. I was impressed with 
the fact that there is a great host of missionaries in 
the field ; that the missionary enterprise is a mighty 
one, supported by the best element in the churches ; 
that the missionary's calling is one of the greatest 
dignity, perhaps the nearest fulfillment of Christ's 
will on earth. One remark made near the end of the 
meeting is well worth remembering: 'The close of 
the Ecumenical Conference is the beginning of the 
Ecumenical conquest.' The meetings as a whole were 
a great inspiration. I hope now to go on from strength 
to strength, without the interruption caused by lack 
of conviction, hesitancy, and other petty things that 
have foolishly hindered my growth." In such con- 
fessions as these his extreme sensitiveness and shrink- 
ing from display appeared. He could not affirm a 
conviction he did not feel. The fibre of his nature 
was so delicate that he sometimes feared his deeds 
might fall behind his faith : " I may be wrong, but I 
have felt as if I did not want to tell of my decision on 
all sides. Telling my near relatives would not be 
advertising myself, but I have felt as if it would be 
better to let the facts appear in due time, without 
haste, when my determination has ripened and de- 



LIFE AT YALE 25 

veloped my life a little more fully ; and so it appears 
to me better to say little or nothing to others about it 
at present." 

In a letter of introspection and intense desire to 
make no slip in his final choice, he writes : " It seems 
to me that if God is at one end of this chain of fact, 
the need of man is at the other, and if I can be one to 
fill the need, that is one reason for my going. I tried 
to examine every foot of ground. I said, ' If God is not 
running any risk in this course, I am running none/ 
Medicine I do not care for; law seems less and less 
attractive as time goes on; journalism is not mine. 
On the ground of common sense my life seems to be 
directed towards serving Christ actively. If a minis- 
ter, why not a missionary ? So you see how practically 
I have gone into this matter. I do not feel that all is 
yet done. I lack deep faith, confident hope, Christian 
joy. If I ever needed your prayers it is now. I am 
face to face with the future ; I must press on." 

In this resolute spirit Warren moved forward. 
His Christian life, natively assertive, now becomes 
intense in its grip on men, in its vision of things 
spiritual. He developed a new instinct for action, 
for service, and for God ; he now finds new ambitions 
to arouse in other lives. 

Returning to New Haven for his last term of Senior 
year, and sitting down in his room in Vanderbilt Hall, 
which he was so soon to leave, he writes: "It is a 



26 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

serious time. May God bless our last months here 
together. Although by this time I ought to have 
become accustomed to leaving home, this last leave- 
taking was as hard as any. The vacation was pe- 
culiarly enjoyable and every member of the family 
seemed dearer. There are so many things that come 
up now, so many advantages to avail myself of, that 
I wish sometimes I had four years more to devote to 
service in college. And yet, from another point of 
view, the nearness with which I approach graduation 
does n't seem to increase my desire to stay. When 
these thoughts come to me I am almost ready to 
accuse myself of disloyalty to Yale. And yet in spite 
of the happy associations and the varied joys of col- 
lege life, graduation is not an altogether distasteful 
thought. There is a new world before me." 

As Commencement Day draws near, he writes: 
"It is impressive, this thought of graduating from 
college, when one has time to think. But thinking 
has not been my lot much of late. Examinations are 
on and I have worked pretty hard so far. Up late at 
night and early in the morning has been my custom, 
with plenty of hard work during the day." 

Warren entered with great ardor into the festivities 
of Commencement Week. It was not an easy thing 
for him to realize that his graduation day had really 
come. To his parents and sister " Dib " (his pet 
name for her) he gave a hearty welcome. Beneath 



LIFE AT YALE 27 

the exterior of pleasantry there always flowed the 
current of reflection. The breaking of college ties 
brought him many a pang of regret; his frequent 
return to his Alma Mater afterwards revealed his 
love for her. 

Were it possible for a single writer to give in one 
picture a view of Warren's college life, no one would 
be better able to do this than William B. Stoskopf, 
who has written : — 

" As a friend and comrade he was ideal, loyal to the 
core and dependable under all circumstances. Room- 
mates for three years as we were, I do not recall the 
slightest act on his part which was unworthy of the 
highest traditions of the Christian gentleman. 

"As a student, while far removed from the 'grind,' 
Warren was careful, painstaking, and thoroughly 
conscientious. He viewed his college studies as a 
preparation for usefulness in his after life, and pos- 
sessed the quality of assimilating knowledge and 
making it a part of himself. It was natural that a man 
who threw himself with his whole soul into as great 
a variety of activities as Warren did, should attain 
a genuine popularity. His moral force and sound 
practical wisdom soon made him a valued counselor 
for many men who prized his friendship. 

"The forcefulness of the man was illustrated in 
the way he announced to me his decision regarding 
his life's work. Although I knew he was deeply inter- 



28 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

ested in the Student Volunteer Movement, I had no 
idea he contemplated going to China until he quietly 
told me one evening as we were sitting in our room. 
What most impressed me was his utter unselfishness. 
The only matter worthy of consideration appeared to 
him to be where his life would count the most for 
God and man. 

" Warren's life was a life with a vision. During his 
college course those near him perceived that he was 
living in that atmosphere of souls where visions may 
be seen. 

"'Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord; or 
who shall rise up in His holy place? Even he that 
hath clean hands and a pure heart.' " 



IV 

HARTFORD SEMINARY 

The transition from College to Theological Sem- 
inary is a sudden and radical one. The student has 
been accustomed to a particular type of man, "the 
college man." Now he is to meet men having before 
them a specific calling, a vocation, whose chief char- 
acteristic is that it demands modesty and an absence 
of ostentation in him who devotes himself to it. And 
yet in entering the Seminary the student makes a 
certain affirmation that he is to become a spiritual 
leader of men. 

Upon one of Warren's build this assumption of 
spiritual leadership made a distinct impression. Was 
he ready for such a calling ? Could he ever become 
an example to others ? His answer came in the ab- 
sorbing purpose of his life, to preach the Gospel of 
Christ. The nature of his chosen profession opened 
to him a great variety of collateral studies which fed 
his passion for knowledge and power, diverting his 
mind for the time being from the intensely spiritual 
weight of responsibility. In College he had lived in a 
broadly democratic world ; in the Seminary he came 
into a more restricted circle. 

In choosing Hartford as the arena of his theological 



30 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

studies Warren was most fortunate. There he min- 
gled with men of similar aspirations with himself, 
there he found spiritual surroundings which culti- 
vated his spiritual purpose. The opening of the fall 
term of 1900 found him settled on the fourth floor of 
Hosmer Hall, with Gilbert Lovell as room-mate, his 
friend in Yale and later in China : " We have three 
rooms, a study flanked by two rooms of unequal 
size," and in this study Warren did a good deal of 
hard work. 

On the intellectual side he made progress with 
marked rapidity. His mind grew in range, pene- 
tration, power of continuity, and in the persistent 
fruits of industry. His college course laid the founda- 
tions solidly ; not till he began his work in the Semi- 
nary did the walls of the superstructure really appear. 
Then they shot up wonderfully fast. His home friends 
observed it, others remarked it, among them one who 
had followed his course with discrimination: "No 
one developed faster than Warren in those years sub- 
sequent to his graduation from College. He would 
probably have kept on growing all the more and all 
the faster because of his late development. Upon 
coming to the Seminary he had not yet 'come unto 
his own,' had not shown what was really in him." 
He made a bold dash at Hebrew and found out what 
sort of a problem he had to solve : " We have had ten 
days of Hebrew, the bugbear of theological study. 



HARTFORD SEMINARY 31 

I cannot say that I thoroughly enjoy it. I used to 
think I had some gift in acquiring languages. Either 
I was mistaken or it is necessary to have a distinct 
talent for Hebrew. I dread losing a single lesson. As 
it is, it is hard to keep up with the pace.'* 

Into the various departments of seminary study he 
threw himself with energy. Whether it was New 
Testament Greek, or Systematic Theology, or Church 
History, he was always the same earnest student. He 
had a way of rapidly assimilating the substance of a 
lecture, or book, thinking while he walked or played 
golf, as well as while he buried himself in his studies. 
His mental activity was intense, his grasp of a sub- 
ject vigorous. He applied himself to strictly theolo- 
gical subjects with a becoming reverence, which led 
him to deal thoroughly and candidly with every truth 
and yet did not hamper his freedom in forming his 
own opinion. 

Next to his mental expansion was his intense fond- 
ness for active work. Soon after he entered the 
Seminary he devoted himself to local missionary en- 
terprises, believing he could thereby increase his effi- 
ciency in reaching men. At various times he did work 
at Warburton Chapel, the Open Hearth, the Friendly 
Brotherhood, the Chinese Sunday - School. After 
visiting a social settlement he wrote : " A fine work, 
but I don't feel as if it were as direct and as effectual 
as evangelistic work." Having been deputed to re- 



32 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

port sermons preached in one of the pulpits of the 
city, he was pleased to be assigned to the Asylum 
Hill Congregational Church. He had a warm place 
in his heart for Mr. Twichell, whose sermon appeared 
in Monday's " Courant." He taught a mission-study 
class in the Wethersfield Avenue Church, taking up 
Japan. He led the young people's meeting at the 
Centre Church and assisted a friend in conducting 
a Boys' Brigade. Added to this was attendance upon 
lectures at the City Hospital given to all missionary 
volunteers. But he discovered he was dipping into 
too many things: "I want to restrict my time and 
strength as the outlines of the future become more 
clearly defined." 

As the seminary years passed Warren derived 
much pleasure from social life. Here his spirit of good 
cheer found ample scope. He needed the relief that 
comes from contact with others : " Last Friday even- 
ing the Seminary held its annual Washington's Birth- 
day celebration. Somehow I have been accused of 
having some abilities in a dramatic way, and was 
drafted into service as manager of a lot of shadow 
pantomimes. It took a deal of time but was appre- 
ciated. Most of the professors attended and enjoyed 
it as much as the younger brethren did." 

His modest refinement of sensibility was a shield 
to him in meeting the vices and the vulgarities of the 
world. There was in him a wholesome and protective 



HARTFORD SEMINARY 33 

love of purity, which pervaded his taste and shaped 
his love of the beautiful in nature and in art. His 
fondness for the choicest poetry was inspired by this 
trait; it was pronounced and individual. His poetic 
preferences were entirely personal. He was drawn 
to Browning, and made a careful study of his deeper 
poems with analytical thoroughness. In his letters 
from the Seminary he speaks of reading "Saul" 
critically. Edward Rowland Sill had many charms 
for him, and he was accustomed to carry a copy of 
Sill with him on his journeys. Wordsworth also he 
greatly enjoyed. His college note-book contains an 
analysis of the "Excursion:" the "Ode to Duty" 
was a favorite with him. But books, poems, paintings, 
all expressions of art, were entirely subordinate to 
life. Preeminent over all the productions of man's 
mind was the man himself, human personality, hu- 
man passion and inspiration. He was fond of Tenny- 
son's " In Memoriam " and tried to fulfil, in his love of 
the chaste and refined, Tennyson's prayer : — 

" I have lived my life, and that which I have done 
May He within himself make pure." 

A man of Warren's enthusiasms was at home 
among boys. Wherever he was he sought young 
blood ; he was always a welcome companion among 
boys and a participant in their games. His adapta- 
bility to this class made him a very successful coun- 
cilor at Camp Asquam, Holderness, New Hamp- 



34 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

shire, where he spent several summers during his 
college and seminary years. Many boys of the camp 
have borne generous testimony to his manly example 
and his personal interest in their welfare. His experi- 
ence at Camp led him to say in an article published 
in a Wellesley paper of August, 1901 : "At the most 
impressionable stage in a boy's career, only the purest 
and most wholesome influences should be suffered 
to exist. The nearer he can be brought into contact 
with nature, the more correctly he can be made to 
indulge in natural and suitable exercise, and the more 
clearly he can be made to appreciate the deeper truths 
of life, the better is he fitted to cope with the duties be- 
fore him. Professors no longer insist upon sending 
all university men through the same mould. Individ- 
ual needs and propensities demand special provision. 
This is even more evident at that earlier stage when 
the character and mind, as well as the body, are 
pliable. It is a rare opportunity for the boys, this 
camping ; a heavy responsibility, together with a great 
pleasure, for those who attempt to mould the precious 
material in their hands. Nothing but the best of effort, 
thought, and care is good enough." 

In the progress of his seminary course Warren 
came to that period when he must put into practice 
the things he had learned. His licensure at the hands 
of the Hartford Association of Congregational Minis- 
ters was granted him in the spring of 1902. Of the 



HARTFORD SEMINARY 35 

examination he writes : " We first read a brief state- 
ment of our religious experience and belief ; then came 
the sermon and our reasons for entering the ministry. 
After that we were subjected to questioning. Several 
spoke to me about my sermon, among them Professor 

, who has referred to it again since then." He 

also wrote Warren's father at the time : " I want to 
express to you my very great satisfaction in your 
son's examination for license before our Association. 
I was especially pleased with his brief sermon, one 
of the best things I have heard from a student for a 
long time. The style and thought were exceptionally 
good." 

It has been observed that those who are by nature 
reserved express their inner selves more easily in 
public than in private. The presence of an audience 
awakens a certain freedom of utterance and "they 
are sheltered by the multitude." Warren was of this 
type, his hearers giving him confidence, and assuring 
him they were with him and glad to hear his voice. 
They gave an elasticity to his thought, vent to his 
emotions, fluency to his speech. When speaking with 
an unseen God in public prayer, his words were apt 
and unaffected. He never expressed himself in a 
stilted or commonplace manner. 

During the summer of 1902 Warren found a clear 
field for the exercise of preaching in a country parish 
in Weathersfield, Vermont. He preached at the 



36 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

"Centre" in the forenoon and at the "Bow" in the 
afternoon. He usually covered the intervening dis- 
tance of four miles on horseback. He did much hard 
study, served faithfully as pastor, visiting the families 
in the parish, and working for the young people. He 
did not get through the season without betraying his 
fondness for base-ball, but, having an invitation to 
play in a match game with a neighboring club, he 
discreetly declined. He issued small cards which 
served as a Weekly calendar, always announcing the 
text, as on one occasion, Revelation xxi, 1, "And 
there shall be no more sea." One who joined the 
church during that brief ministry, and who afterwards 
became an earnest Christian worker in a New Hamp- 
shire town, writes : " While Mr. Seabury was in our 
home we all learned to love him and to admire his 
manly, winsome Christian bearing. I shall never 
forget the lessons he taught me ; they were many and 
varied. He tutored me in Latin, but the one thing 
I best remember was a suggestion of his as to how to 
study, which helped me over more than one hard 
subject later. His influence upon my life did not end 
with his departure that summer. I often read the 
letter he wrote me just before he left for China. It 
was typical of his courageous helpfulness. He wanted 
us to think of him as one ' who remembers though far 
away.' Since his death I have reconsecrated my life 
to the Master's service ; I am trying to be worthy of 



HARTFORD SEMINARY 37 

the hope he had in me. I want others to know that 
one life is richer because he lived." 

In this new work of preaching Warren gave pro- 
mise of much success. His friends affirmed that he 
possessed marked qualifications for it. He had so 
thoroughly studied theological subjects, made so 
completely his own the thought he aimed to present, 
that it became easy for him to give it to others. He 
felt that the true preacher could not be the product 
of a theological factory ; the man must grow his ser- 
mon. It could not be produced by a series of lecture 
courses ; it must be the product of an awakened soul. 
His spiritual reserve distinctly favored this growth of 
the inner life and its fullest expression in the pulpit ; 
through this preaching there ran the golden thread 
of sincerity and naturalness which made its way to 
the hearts of those who heard him. His strong, sono- 
rous voice gave the delivery of his sermon an appar- 
ent ease which found an echo in his hearers, reassur- 
ing him in return. He always kept his voice at a 
medium register, speaking with a clear enunciation ; 
he made but few gestures. In the summer of 1903, 
during the vacation season, he preached in the Ded- 
ham pulpit. Of the occasion a friend wrote at the 
time : " We have just come from morning service and 
I hasten to tell you how proud we all are of Warren. 
You can hardly imagine the great pleasure our people 
have had in listening to his first sermon in our church. 



38 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

He seemed much at home in the old pulpit and gave 
us a fine discourse. We had the largest congregation 
this summer, and many greeted him personally after 
the service. You have great reason to rejoice in the 
prospects of your eldest son, and we are glad to think 
of him as one of the children of our church." 

The critical studies of his seminary course were 
drawing to their close, and Warren came back to 
Hartford in the spring of 1903 for the final "pull." 
If his mental growth had been rapid and solid, his 
spiritual expansion had kept pace with it. He threw 
himself more fully than ever into the life about him. 
His " genius for friendship " was never more apparent 
than during those last seminary days. Out of it grew 
a desire, amounting to self-effacing eagerness, to im- 
part some measure of happiness to others. Upon the 
higher levels he sought their good, their spiritual 
betterment. Looking back over this period, after 
Warren's death, one of the professors thus estimates 
his character : " The bright, cheery face, the winsome 
manner, the full - blooded life, the frank, noble, 
straightforward manhood, the spiritual Christ char- 
acter — these all come up before us as we think of 
those three years when he tarried with us at the 
Seminary. We have told you more than once of how 
we valued his influence in the seminary life which 
gathers round us year by year and which, in such a 
peculiar way, has its own problems and its own possi- 



HARTFORD SEMINARY 39 

bilities ; but we wish now to tell it again with added 
emphasis and deeper feeling. From the time he 
crossed the threshold of Hosmer Hall he was a power, 
not only with his classmates, but with all those who 
made up the common fraternity of the student life. 
If it was athletics he was at its enthusiastic front; 
if it was the social life he was its natural gathering 
point ; if it was study he gave others to see what was 
the honest, faithful spirit ; if it was missions he stood 
for all the work of an interested learner and a de- 
voted doer of all that missions offered to be done." 

It was in Warren's devotion to missions that his 
seminary course came to its ripe fruitage. The primal 
question had been settled and he was to be a servant 
of the Master in a foreign field. His ambition reached 
its climax in a burning zeal for service abroad, not 
always a visible flame, but perpetually a fire on the 
hearthstone of his inner life. During the last term 
he preached a good deal in various places, speaking 
on missions at Talcottville, Simsbury, Southington, 
Meriden, and in other towns in Connecticut. He also 
spoke at Amherst, Massachusetts, at South Hadley, 
and Mt. Hermon. But he did not neglect the little 
pulpit outside of Hartford, of which he writes : " To- 
night I have been out to Blue Hills. Small audience, 
very, but a big subject, exceedingly. If one was 
helped it was worth the work and the time. We speak 
of people's having different talents, but we some- 



40 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

times wonder why the flesh is so weak and the lips 
so slow in using the talents which we have. Oh, for 
powers of expression and helpfulness ! Do you know 
it is a relief not to be waiting, writing, fussing, praying 
for a church ? So many of the fellows are disturbed 
over the question of their future. I am mercifully 
spared this agony. I am bearing up pretty well under 
much work of one kind and another, seeing that a 
whole life is before me." 

In February, 1902, while a member of the Middle 
class, Warren attended the Student Volunteer Con- 
vention at Toronto, with an attendance of twenty- 
five hundred delegates: "The speaking was fine. I 
do not feel that the meetings lifted me to any high 
range of enthusiasm and any such intensity of feeling 
as I have experienced at similar great gatherings. 
But the mighty truths I already knew were forced 
deeper down into my soul. I was strengthened in 
my faith rather than deeply moved. If this is really 
the effect upon me, I am really glad. It will, I am 
sure, prove of more lasting benefit. Speer and Mott 
were there in all their power. Personal consecration, 
prayer, interest in the work of Christ in the neediest 
places, and the cultivation of His presence ran all 
through the sessions. I felt more strongly than ever 
that my work has been well chosen and am happy in 
the choice. May its influence upon me never be lost." 

Warren rejoiced in the coming to Hartford of 



HARTFORD SEMINARY 41 

President W. D. McKenzie, writing : " Dr. McKenzie 
is an inspiration. He is now lecturing on the incarna- 
tion and the atonement — those absolutely fundamen- 
tal themes — so thoroughly, reverently, spiritually ! I 
feel as if he were laying out the true ethics, the ration- 
ale of the whole Divine scheme (as far as an humble 
man can understand it), and though I fail to grasp 
it in anything like its clearness I feel as if the Truth 
lay with him. I must read it, think it, live it into 
myself. We are glad of the opportunity of hearing 
such noble and inspiring presentations of the funda- 
mental truths. I think my theology is now settling 
down to a solid Rock, that which is laid in Jesus 
Christ ; in His Divine death for human sin. It is by no 
means clear even to the best of men, but I think I 
know where the Truth lies and thither I will travel." 
President McKenzie has kindly furnished his per- 
sonal recollections : " My acquaintance with Warren 
as a student at Hartford was confined to the three 
weeks during which I lectured here to the Senior Class 
in January, 1903. This was before I was called to my 
present position in this Institution. But his person- 
ality was such as even in that brief time to leave a 
definite impression upon my mind. He stands out 
from the crowd of students whom I picture as I recall 
them, for the sweetness and strength of his character. 
He seemed to be a man of singularly pure mind, of 
deep earnestness, of quiet dignity in his bearing. 



42 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

While his Christian zeal was apparent to every one, 
it was combined with a very hearty and happy man- 
ner. He took an interest in the sports of his fellows, 
and was a leader in their base-ball games. He looked 
forward to his life-work with intense delight, pre- 
pared for it with great diligence, entered upon it with 
high hopes. We must trust that the active life so 
soon cut short here was called away to some form of 
service in another sphere." 

Warren graduated from Hartford Seminary in 
May, 1903, receiving the degree of Bachelor of Di- 
vinity. He delivered the class oration, choosing as his 
subject "Success;" he also represented the class at 
the Alumni dinner and spoke at the planting of the 
class ivy. The Seminary offered him the opportunity 
of studying methods of missionary instruction in 
England, Scotland, and Germany and, on his return, 
of lecturing on the subject before the students. It was 
his choice, however, to take a final year at Yale, 
studying philosophy and comparative religions. He 
reentered the University in the autumn of 1903 and 
located in Divinity Hall ; he joined the Graduates 
Club, where he found much to gratify his social 
tastes. He took the Law School Bible Class, also the 
graduate students in the same department, of which 
he writes : " I had my first session with the * grads ' 
this noon. It is going to be interesting, I am sure. My 
purpose is to have a sort of parliament, with plenty 



HARTFORD SEMINARY 43 

of questions and suggestions from the class ; this will 
be the order and not the exception." 

With a very profitable year at New Haven he fin- 
ished his preparation for his life's work, and received 
from Yale the degree of Master of Arts. 

On the ninth day of June, 1904, Warren was or- 
dained to the ministry at the First Church in Hart- 
ford. Addresses were made by Professor M. W. 
Jacobus, of Hartford Seminary, Rev. Anson Phelps 
Stokes, Jr., of Yale University, Rev. James L. Barton, 
of the American Board. Professor F. K. Sanders 
gave the Right Hand of Fellowship ; Warren's father 
offered the ordaining prayer. 

One who knew him thoroughly during his sem- 
inary course and followed him through the remain- 
ing years of his life gives this resume of Warren's 
qualities : — 

" First of all was his poise and self-control ; he 
seemed always to be able to meet things in a calm and 
fair manner. With this poise was the other supple- 
mental characteristic, which showed itself when the 
occasion called, of ability to do things with vigor and 
precision and with apparent confidence. These two 
traits were perhaps the ones which first made their 
influence felt in my life with him. Of course with 
these was the buoyant, cheerful, optimistic tempera- 
ment which he always showed. I rarely ever saw him 
cast down, though he showed that this buoyancy was 



44 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

no evidence of superficial thought or feeling. When 
one got into his inner experience, then one saw that 
back of the cheerfulness and candor and frankness 
and breeziness, there was sober, well-developed man- 
hood. 

"I did not see the full growth of his intellectual 
powers so much during the work in the Seminary, 
as I seemed to see it after his post-graduate course the 
year following. Then he went forward untrammelled 
by any of the pre-suppositions which many of us had 
in the earlier work, and his mind seemed to throw off 
shackles and grow by leaps and bounds. Though 
arriving at different conclusions from those he once 
held, though his theological statements were different 
from those he would have made earlier, there was no 
arrogance in their expression. Ever constructive in 
all his work, here, too, he sought to construct out 
of his former thoughts a nobler and sounder belief. 

"It was the enlarging vision of life, the growing 
feeling of the greater brotherhood of man, combined 
with the native courtliness of the man, which, it 
seemed to me, marked him out for the peculiar work 
he was called to perform in China. There was no 
place in such work for the bigot, the recluse, the mys- 
tic, or the man bound to a hard and fast set of tradi- 
tional statements. He seemed to measure up to the 
requirements of his post and bade fair to engrave his 
character and worth upon many a life in that land." 



V 

THE CALL TO CHINA — THE JOURNEY OUT 

One April afternoon in the year 1900, three Yale 
Seniors, en route to New York to attend the Ecumen- 
ical Foreign Missionary Conference, were earnestly 
engaged in conversation. Their proposition — the 
missionary work of the University concentrated under 
one of the denominational Boards — was germinal 
but not new. These Volunteers, one of whom was 
Warren, then and there agreed to try later to be thus 
associated on the foreign field, where and how was 
naturally left undetermined. 

The following summer, Northfield, with its un- 
wonted emphasis on missions due to the number of 
eminent Ecumenical Conference speakers gathered 
there that season, whetted the enthusiasm of these 
three young men. The situation at Peking and the 
perils of the Boxer outbreak added to the impressive- 
ness, the gravity, the pathos of the hour. Under the 
impulse of that great gathering two basal facts were 
wrought into Warren's mind: one, if a man has a 
talent for God's work at home he can find a com- 
manding field for its exercise abroad ; the other, every 
student must answer the question, "Why should I 
stay at home in this great crisis ? " In his decision to 



46 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

go, already made, he was splendidly reenforced by 
the sweeping enthusiasm of the hour. Furthermore, 
several men, classmates of these Yale Seniors, them- 
selves unable to go, came to them and offered to stand 
behind them financially when they were ready for 
their fields of labor. The Yale Missionary idea had 
not then crystallized; it was slowly growing in the 
minds of a few Yale men, awaiting its full time. 

Shortly after the opening of the winter term at 
Hartford Seminary, the subject was fully considered 
by Arthur C. Williams, Gilbert Lovell, and Warren 
in the room of the latter in Hosmer Hall. Warren 
had been profoundly moved by reading " Pilkington 
of Uganda." Might it not be well, he thought, to 
establish a Yale Mission in Africa, the continent 
which had witnessed Pilkington's glorious self-sacri- 
fice ? As time went on new light broke upon the gen- 
eral plan and with it new confidence that a Yale 
Mission would ere long be realized. The Boxer mas- 
sacres, with their awful record of suffering and death, 
already suppressed, gave evidence of an immediate 
reaction in favor of greatly accelerated missionary 
work in China. The blood of the martyr, Pitkin, a 
recent graduate of Yale, brought China still nearer 
the hearts of her alumni. These and other consid- 
erations pointed to China as the seat of the future 
Yale Mission. 

Seated before the old fireplace in Mr. Stokes's 



THE CALL TO CHINA 47 

house in New Haven, February 10, 1901, Arthur 
C. Williams and Warren B. Seabury laid before Mr. 
Speer full details of the Yale plan to date. To the 
recital, for which they had made careful preparation, 
Mr. Speer gave close attention, resulting in his hearty 
endorsement. He saw great missionary possibilities 
in the scheme, and encouraged the young men to 
go forward and consult the officers of the American 
Board in relation to its expansion. Professor Beach 
foresaw the problem of finance, believing that if this 
could be firmly fixed, "no missionary board would 
refuse" them. Still later, Dr. Barton, Secretary of 
the American Board, gave it as his opinion : " The 
more I have thought over the plan the more it seems to 
me to be feasible and practicable, provided the back- 
ing at Yale is sufficient. The suggestion that China 
be the field chosen will no doubt command the hearty 
cooperation of all the officers of the Board, its Pru- 
dential Committee and the wide public. ... It is 
important that so far as you go you carry everything 
before you. Your plan is very attractive and is 
worthy of every effort to make it a success." 

At the memorial service for Warren, more than 
three years later, President Capen of the American 
Board said : " Early in the winter of 1901 Warren 
Seabury and Arthur Williams unfolded their plan to 
Secretary Barton, asking if the Board would affiliate 
in any way with such a work as they had in mind. 



48 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

They expressed a desire to talk with me. Dr. Barton 
suggested that I point out the obstacles and difficul- 
ties before them, saying : * I have done this and have 
not shaken them in their purpose ; they always have 
an answer ready.' An appointment was made and they 
came to Boston for the interview. Williams was 
taken ill and Seabury alone unfolded to me the plan 
and told of his vision of the future. Of the greatness 
of what we believe are to be its results only the future 
will disclose. Fifty or a hundred years hence, with 
China saved to the Kingdom of God, it will be seen 
how great has been the work which Seabury and his 
colleagues inaugurated." 

Then follow in rapid succession interviews with 
various men at the Yale end, pointing to the organ- 
ization of the Mission, — President Hadley, Dean 
Wright, Mr. Stokes, Professors Williams, Sanders, 
and Reed, and others, endorsing the plan. The first 
prospectus of the College was drawn up in May, 
1901, but was never issued. At Northfield, during 
the summer following, after consultation with Mr. 
John R. Mott and Dr. Howard Taylor of the China 
Inland Mission, Professor Beach, Dean Sanders, and 
A. C. Williams made the first draft of the constitu- 
tion. 1 

1 The genesis of the Yale Mission in China has been fully de- 
scribed in Dr. H. B. Wright's invaluable Memorial of John Law- 
rence Thurston, "A Life with a Purpose," pp. 179-203, 207-260, 
263-289. 



THE CALL TO CHINA 49 

Important adjustments became necessary, finally 
resulting in the full equipment of the Yale Mission 
for work in China. Cordial affiliation with the Amer- 
ican Board was established, giving to the Yale Mis- 
sion entire freedom of action based upon its inde- 
pendent financial support, the wholly undenomina- 
tional aspect of the Mission being clearly set forth. At 
this stage missionary work of a general character 
was contemplated, with education as a prominent 
feature. 

During this year Warren put into writing his own 
conception of the character and purpose of the Yale 
Mission, as follows: — 

" Under the inspiration of the great Ecumenical 
Conference in New York in the spring of 1900, the 
original project regarding a Yale Foreign Mission 
became articulate. The enthusiasm for missions 
which throbbed in those great gatherings in Carnegie 
Hall did not suppress the enthusiasm which we as 
Yale men felt for our own College. Surely two such 
mighty forces would unite. If the great burden of the 
church were missions, if the educated and enlightened 
people of Christendom were, under God, moving in 
invincible ranks against the forces of evil, surely the 
College of our choice would not do better than add 
its strength to the strong. 

"And then we, who were planning to spend our 
lives in foreign service, felt that we could be more 



50 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

efficient having the inspiration of men at our side, 
not only stirred by the same great purpose, but with 
the interests common to young men, to college men, 
yes, to Yale men. It was our conviction that our lives 
would be stronger with the Yale spirit on the field and 
the old College behind us. 

" This was all very well, but it was not so easy to 
plan the details of support and management. In fact 
the constitution, as it now stands, shows but slight 
resemblance to its rude forerunner of two years ago. 
For after repeated consultations two or three of us 
were firmly convinced that the plan was practicable. 
The back room at the Graduates Club witnessed 
some earnest attempts to collect arguments, arrange 
them in logical order and present them with the most 
telling effect for our expected interviews with men 
of experience. Our own growing confidence was 
greatly increased by talking with Mr. Speer, Mr. 
Beach, Dr. Barton, Dr. Capen, Mr. Stokes, Mr. 
Roberts, besides many in closest sympathy with the 
College and with deepest faith in her support. 

" And so, as wiser heads than ours have taken the 
plan as we outlined it in general and have developed 
it, as we could not have done, we are content to stand 
by and see the College we love take a hand in the great 
cause that we love and wait until we are wanted." 

Lawrence Thurston joined the group of men pro- 
jecting the Yale Mission after much of the prelim- 



THE CALL TO CHINA 51 

inary work had been done. But he came at the im- 
portant hour when the question of the relation of the 
Mission to the University itself was under considera- 
tion. From that time on he was an influential factor 
in the counsels of the committee. He gave to the 
Mission his intense love of the foreign work, his rare 
self-dedication, his humble devotion to its highest 
welfare. To his painstaking research, his judicious 
balancing of arguments, his obedience to every token 
of Providential guidance is due the selection of 
Changsha as the city for the establishment of the 
Mission. To him belongs the credit of solving this 
most vital problem. In his death, which occurred 
at San Bernardino, California, May 10, 1904, this 
pioneer of the Yale Mission passed on to his reward. 
To the initial question of selecting a home for the 
Mission Mrs. Thurston, also, contributed of her rare 
good sense. Her personal consecration to the work is 
abundantly assured by her return to China, to the 
labors of her husband in the promising development 
of the Yale Mission College. 

Lawrence Thurston received his appointment 
June 6, 1902. Next in order came Brownell Gage, 
still doing loyal and telling work at Changsha. War- 
ren was third in the order of appointment, the date 
being November 3, 1902. 

After his death, Mr. Speer wrote of the initial days 
of the Mission as follows : " I knew Warren well and 



52 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

had the warmest regard for him. My recollections of 
him are in connection with the talks which he, Mr. 
Williams, and I had with reference to the founding 
of the Yale Mission. In the dining-room of the Grad- 
uates Club in New Haven and before the old fireplace 
in Mr. Stokes's house we talked over the idea of the 
Yale Mission, what form it should take, to what 
motives appeals should be made, and how the founda- 
tions of such a mission could be laid so as to be solid 
and permanent and to endure the strain which every 
foreign mission must meet and which we then little 
dreamed the Yale Mission would have to meet in 
Warren's tragic death. I remember the calm poise, 
the patient but solid judgment, the smiling recogni- 
tion of difficulties which were in the way only to be 
triumphantly overcome, and the entirely simple and 
unself -conscious, but for those very reasons the more 
steadfast and all-embracing, consecration. I recall 
those conversations clearly and with great gratitude 
for the share which they gave me in Warren's life 
purposes and in the work of the Yale Mission." 

From the day Warren received his appointment 
he gave himself to the business of personal prepara- 
tion for his work. First came the further discipline 
of his mind in philosophical thinking, in ethics and 
philology. He made no specific study of the Chinese 
language, believing that should be acquired on the 
field itself. He bent his energies to the fullest under- 



THE CALL TO CHINA 53 

standing of China's problems, especially her problem 
of education. Henceforth he was to be a citizen of 
China, which was to him more than a vast aggrega- 
tion of souls, or a stupendous geographical area in 
Eastern Asia. China lived in him as a synonym of 
personal reality and manhood. 

The summer of 1904 was a very busy one. The 
outfit must be gathered, library, furniture, tools, 
pictures, clothing, ornaments ; all these must be care- 
fully packed and forwarded. The packing room of 
the American Board witnessed some business not 
exclusively its own, such is the kindly cooperation of 
the elder brother. 

Now come the last appointments for preaching, the 
last visits to the homes of relatives that had become 
so deeply interested in the future of one whom they 
had known and loved from childhood, the last talks 
with the home circle. As he wrote to one of the Yale 
Committee : " It is somewhat hard to say ' good-bye,' 
but a man must play the game and I expect the best 
of good things for all those who do their duty as they 
see it." But the pain of saying farewell was not 
alluded to at home and he left with a cheery face and 
a resolute voice. 

" All 's well and I am happy ! Too beautiful to be 
sad!" are the words he sent home two days after, 
September 17th, his twenty-seventh birthday. 

Writing of Warren's brief visit at his house at 



54 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Lake Forest, Illinois, while on his way across the 
continent, Rev. Dr. J. G. K. McClure says: "I in- 
vited Warren into the pulpit with me on the Sunday 
morning of his visit, that I might introduce him and 
his special work to all the people here. Then in the 
evening he addressed the congregation. You must 
let me say that he impressed me as a very unusual 
young man. His thought is wise, his language is 
appropriate, his judgment is balanced, and his spirit 
is beautiful. I thanked God for him and all that he 
stands for. He left a happy and a beneficent influ- 
ence here upon all, both young and old. I feel like 
congratulating you upon the honor and satisfaction 
of having such a son for such a work ! May God ever 
bless and keep him. I can think of no higher reward 
for parentage than you now have." 

At Denver Warren enjoyed for a day the charm- 
ing hospitality of Mr. Washington McClintock. He 
preached for Rev. Dr. J. B. Gregg of Colorado 
Springs. On his arrival at San Francisco he was 
greeted by friends, old and new. Letters and tele- 
grams were received by him from the church in 
Dedham, from the home circle, and from the Yale 
Mission at New Haven, all speeding him on his 
voyage Chinaward. Of the voyage itself and the 
ports visited he subsequently wrote : — 

"The Gaelic sailing from San Francisco on the 
first day of October bore a very mixed collection of 



THE JOURNEY OUT 55 

humanity. Her officers were British but the crew were 
Celestials, big, strong men from Canton, which, by 
the way, does one of the largest export trades of any 
coast city, in citizens who go to many parts of the 
world to find a better living than in the crowded place 
of their birth. There were missionaries on board, 
constituting a majority of the passenger list, teachers 
going to the Philippines, globe trotters and non- 
descripts. The second cabin and the steerage were 
occupied by Chinese and Japanese. The Govern- 
ment had decided that they were undesirable citizens 
and were sending them back whence they came. 

" Who can describe the little gem of tropical loveli- 
ness which lies on the bosom of the Pacific — Hawaii ! 
Its fearless cliffs rising from the water's edge, the 
snowy sands and rolling waves which bring in all the 
greens and blues that nature knows and break in that 
clear light so white that one can think only of purity 
itself. High palms and luxuriant flowers crowding 
the Island with exuberance, and all bathed in the soft 
warm atmosphere, clean from the great sea about it 
and sweetened by the Island's fragrant slopes. One 
can forget the people he saw there, on this threshold 
of the East, the thrifty little Japs, Chinese laborers 
coming in from the country with their produce or 
doing the more menial work of the city, the swarthy 
natives and especially the women with their wrapper- 
like garments of the most brilliant hues ; he can forget 



56 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the impression made on him by this strange motley- 
population enjoying the summer sun in early Octo- 
ber, but there was a beauty about the place, a bril- 
liancy and fragrance of sunshine and sea and car- 
peted hillsides, which one can never forget. The 
scene as we steamed slowly out of the shelter of the 
harbor on that Saturday evening at sunset was beau- 
tiful. On the lowlands and rising with the lower 
flanks of the hills was a gorgeous carpeting of livid 
green. They told us it was the young rice. The sea 
had a saffron touch from the declining sun, and where 
it broke in splendid waves on the shore there were 
bright rolls of foam and flashes of green over the 
white sand that we could see nowhere else. Up over 
the city rose the hills fluted and rough beneath a 
thick cover of tropical trees and shrubs. There was a 
strange mist rising from the wet lowlands, rolling 
languidly up the sides of the island, looking like a 
golden veil in the horizontal rays of the sun." 

The voyage was again broken at Yokohama, where 
he left the ship, taking the night train for Kyoto. 
In this way he caught a glimpse of the country, vis- 
ited the Doshisha, and saw some Yale men whom he 
knew. He was fascinated with the busy, joyous life 
of the people, their skilful work in beaten gold, silver, 
and wood, their grotesque figures in bronze. He 
joined the steamer at Kobe, and continuing the ac- 
count of his journey, he writes : — 



THE JOURNEY OUT 57 

" At last we reached our first Chinese city, Shang- 
hai, but it was found to be strangely Western. In the 
Concession where all the foreigners live and where 
almost all the business of the place is done, the 
streets are wide and the buildings show the touch of 
a different hand from the Chinese. The streets are 
filled with carriages, 'rickshas, and bicycles. The 
driving is furious. Two men in queer livery of colored 
cotton robes with capes sit on the box and yell them- 
selves hoarse at people who presume so much upon 
the rights of carriages as to be in the street at the 
same time ! It is n't a beautiful place, this city of 
Shanghai, but missionaries and others going into the 
interior stop and lay in a stock of those things which 
no other city in this part of China can furnish. And 
you can get almost everything you want there, but 
it is far from the quality you find in New York and 
usually bears a higher price. 

" One week we spent in such shopping, in which 
time I also found a chance to see something of what 
is being done in the matter of education. There are 
many schools in the city and its suburbs, schools 
which send their graduates all over the country as 
teachers and interpreters. English is a very lucrative 
accomplishment at present, which explains how it is 
that all institutions which offer courses in the subject 
find no trouble in filling up their quota. But the com- 
plaint is that many come simply for this acquirement, 



58 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

caring nothing for Christianity or true scholarship, 
but staying only so long as it is necessary to get a 
little of the language and then taking up with an offer 
in a business firm or some other activity where a very 
fair salary can be earned." 



VI 

THE WINTER AT HANKOW 

During his brief stay at Shanghai Warren went 
out to see St. John's College, which he afterwards 
praised in generous terms; at some future time 
may Yale have as good a plant, a school as well 
equipped. 

Mr. Harlan P. Beach writes, December 7, 1904: 
" I received a letter from Warren written at Shanghai. 
I can hardly think of a better prophecy for a success- 
ful future in that Empire than his thoughtful discus- 
sion of what he had already noted in that city and 
its suburbs. If all our men are as observant and wise 
as he and Gage I think the Yale Mission need never 
have any fear about strong leadership in the educa- 
tional field. Some things which Warren says, on the 
basis of the most enlightened section of China, have 
no special relation to present conditions in a Province 
which has for decades been the most anti-foreign one 
in the Empire ; but the same spirit which has made 
him grasp so strongly conditions in one part of China, 
will enable him equally well to grapple with the 
different problems in the far interior." 

It is an affecting episode that while he was at St. 
John's College Warren formed the acquaintance of 



60 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Arthur S. Mann, who three years later gave up his 

life in a noble struggle to save him. 

From this time on the story of his life must be, 

mainly, the transcript of his own impressions, the 

work he is doing, the lessons he is learning. Now 

that he is really in China the history must unfold with 

his own pen as our guide : — 

" History is half-dream, — aye, even 

The man's life in the letters of the man." 

On the way up the great Yangtse River he writes : 
" We are on a river-boat running up to Hankow. I 
used to wonder when I looked at a map of China, 
what the country is like. Now I see. Along the banks 
the land is very low and rather measly. Back from 
the shore there are mountains, but no trees on the 
mountains, which are yet green with some kind of 
underbrush. We are sometimes very near the bank 
and again out in the middle of the stream, which 
varies from two to nine miles in width and is the color 
of Postum coffee. Where the land rises a little you 
often see clusters of houses of a dirty brown color, 
built mostly of mud and reeds with thatched roofs, 
one story in height. Around the door-step are seen 
black pigs and white goats. Here you see great water 
buffalo with which the people do their plowing ; they 
are of a mouse color. All along these flats there is a 
growth of reeds, twelve or more feet in height, and 
the Chinese are, at this season of the year, cutting them 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 61 

down, binding them into bundles, and taking them 
off to market. The tops go to waste or are used for 
thatching. The captain was telling me this morning 
about the game of this region. Pheasant Island, 
which we were passing, contained plenty of the birds 
for which it was named, he said ; also, duck and deer. 
There are no game laws here and the animals and 
birds are more often snared than shot. This morning 
we saw four or five men in a boat driving before them 
a flock of tame ducks which were swimming in close 
order, innocently making their way to market. A 
man in the bow with a long whip in his hand kept 
them together as easily as if he were driving sheep 
on shore. Every now and then you see on the edge of 
the bank a big net stretched by means of poles so as 
to form a great square, caught at the corners. By 
means of a lever and a rope the whole net is lowered 
into the water and raised again. A man in front of a 
little straw hut every now and then pulls up the net 
hopefully, but usually without result ; and yet all day 
the patient fisherman, at short intervals, peeps at it 
and, with such poor little things as shiners only a few 
inches long, finds his reward. Now and then we strike 
broad flats which are being cultivated for rice and 
cotton, but the land as a whole has rather a poor 
look. It is comfortable sitting on deck without a 
coat." 

Hankow is the greatest inland port in the world ; 



62 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

it has a population of a million souls. Located on 
the Yangtse, at the confluence of that river with the 
Han, it commands the commerce of a vast range of 
territory, the most fertile and the richest provinces 
of China. A writer has said : "Absolutely uninterest- 
ing in its physical features, built on a vast plain, the 
greater part of which, lying only a few feet above the 
level of the river, is submerged for many miles during 
the annual floods, it owes its importance solely to its 
vast trade and the energy of its inhabitants. Its shops 
and warehouses are exceptionally large, handsome 
and numerous ; its merchants are princes ; its various 
provincial and trade guilds are enormously wealthy 
and have great influence." On his fourth day from 
Shanghai, Warren reached the great city, from which 
he writes his first home letter after the journey : " At 
last we are in Hankow, where we can settle down and 
draw a full breath. The trip up the river was delight- 
ful. I felt as if we had a private yacht and had all the 
world to ourselves. It was roomy and clean. The air 
and food were good. On the steamer I was always 
hungry and always found a delightful provision for 
my wants. Here in China, at least so far, things are 
what I like. I could ask for no better. Imagine Han- 
kow, as you come up the river, strung along the bank 
for several miles. A high stone wall runs from her 
water mark up to the level of * The Bund,' which in 
these cities of the East is a broad boulevard extending 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 63 

along the water front, with trees and seats it may be, 
bordered on the land side with business houses and 
offices and open to the water on the other. This is a 
part of the foreign Concession. As soon as our ship 
came up to the ' hulk,' a ship anchored permanently 
out in deep water and connected with the land by a 
movable bridge, the Chinese from shore began to 
pour into our ship and those on board began to push 
their way out." Upon landing he made his way to the 
house where he was to stay : " The streets of the for- 
eign Concession are broad, often shaded with trees 
and having sidewalks, at least on one side of the street. 
High whitish walls of stucco run all along in front 
of the houses and you enter through gateways. More 
privacy and safety are thus secured. Our house is a 
two-story affair, but each story is very high, the rooms 
being two and a half times as high as the door. All 
the rooms open out on to a veranda, both on the 
lower and upper floors. One roof covers the whole 
and the front supports of the veranda are of the same 
material as the house itself — pillars of heavy stucco, 
so that you might speak of two walls, one mostly open- 
ings under the line of the edge of the roof and the other 
six or eight feet back, the house-wall proper. The 
windows opening out on to these verandas are all tall 
doors. The house is owned by some tea merchants, 
who are here in the summer and have built accord- 
ingly, i. e. the rooms are extra large. This feature 



64 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

adds a coldness and sombreness to the appearance. 
As you enter the front door you find yourself in a 
hall running through to the rear. On the right and 
at the front is my study. It was used by the merchants 
as an office, a huge spacious apartment, about seven 
paces square and almost cubical in shape. My sleep- 
ing room is the one over this and big enough for our 
whole family. And O ! joy of joys ! my boxes have 
come." 

Warren settled down at Hankow for a good winter's 
work. He was associated in his social and student 
life with his friend, Brownell Gage, who, with Mrs. 
Gage, made a pleasant home for him. His letters 
during that busy winter were full of good cheer, 
abounding in descriptions of the ways and character- 
istics of the Chinese and in innumerable pleasantries 
suggested by the new world into which he had come : 
"I have been in the country two weeks and, think 
of it, I have n't learned the language yet." Warren's 
buoyancy, however, did not obscure his sense of the 
colossal proportions of the task to which he gave him- 
self unremittingly. His ideal was a high one, but 
instructions from "the Home Office" lifted that 
standard still higher : " You must be finished scholars 
in the Chinese language. We want our teachers to be 
so thoroughly conversant with it, even though it takes 
years of study, that if necessary you could be used in 
diplomatic matters and in places where only a scholar 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 65 

could hold positions of confidence and trust. We have 
very high standards in everything for this Mission 
and we are going to maintain them at any cost." 
"That sounds like business," writes Warren: "It 
means work for us and sent us back to the hen- 
scratches with renewed vigor. My teacher usually 
arrives at ten — or so. Like the rest of his race, he has 
no idea of promptness, but saunters in any time about 
the middle of the morning; then we begin to study. 
We open our books to the lesson ; he notes the Chi- 
nese character and gives the pronunciation ; I repeat 
it after him again and again, until it seems fairly well 
imbedded in my mind. Not only must I get the right 
combination of letters, but there are five distinct tones 
in the Hankow dialect and if I do not get the right 
one, the pronunciation is inaccurate. This failure 
to get the all-important tone is what often makes 
the missionary an object of ridicule. Then I write 
the word down in English, properly representing the 
Chinese sound by the use of our letters. For example, 
the teacher pronounces what is represented by a 
Chinese character and I write 'sen,' which is the 
proper pronunciation, and the tone, tone number 
one, or the high, steady tone. Then I combine words 
into sentences, or practise sounds, using the same 
word in five tones. He puts the character on pieces of 
paper, which I study, and so on. Every morning 
my teacher has tea brought to him by 'the boy,' 



66 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

simply hot water poured over the leaves, and he 
drinks away, often out of the nozzle of the little tea- 
pot." In a letter to Professor Reed, while at Hankow, 
Warren writes : " It sometimes becomes tiring to grub 
away at this interminable language, but I am glad you 
expect so much of us. It will keep us hard at work 
in the recognition of the work we are bound to 
do. It is patience which we need in the acquisition of 
this reasonless, armless, footless, bottomless, endless 
language. One can't do much of anything out here 
in a hurry (unless it be to get sick) and first in the 
list of these impossibilities stands the language. We 
are hard at work and will remain as hard at it as 
we can consistently with the demands of health and 
efficiency." In one of his letters home he humorously 
writes : " Yesterday, after six hours' work on the lan- 
guage, I felt as if I never wanted to see another Chi- 
nese character. They all seemed like so many choco- 
late creams left out in the rain." 

The initial stage of a foreigner's life in China is 
spent in becoming acclimatized to his strange sur- 
roundings. Warren fully realized he was living in a 
new world, one which had to be learned, a world of 
swarming multitudes, of strange anomalies, of per- 
plexing contradictions : — 

"The way these people dress in winter is simple 
but effective; they put on more clothes. The richer 
ones have fur-lined garments, and the very wealthy 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 67 

have the most beautiful and expensive robes, but 
the common people simply put on more layers. My 
teacher told me to-day that he had on eight layers. 
Little children look almost spherical and when they 
fall down are sometimes unable to get up again. 
Many of the men who are out a good deal wear woolen 
caps, often lined with fur, which can be pulled down 
over the face and ears ; others wear cloth hoods. The 
sleeves of the Chinese clothes are very long. They 
are often turned over when it is warm or they are 
in the way, but in winter they are very convenient. 
The hands are clasped and they are both covered. 
A little blowing down one sleeve will warm things 
up a good deal. Still some of the coolies look very 
chill and miserable on the cold days. Below the waist 
the poorer ones seem to have but one thickness of 
clothing and the legs are usually bare below the knee. 
The upper garments are patched and worn and often 
hang loosely and feebly around the man who appears 
to be bluer than the bluest of the various shades of 
blue worn by the shiverer. The old nurse, Amah, 
whom Mrs. Gage has for her baby, is a treasure. 
It is funny to see her stumping around the house. 
She has small feet and, like most of the women, her 
ankles are stiff. Then she wears pantaloons, very 
loose and big, which terminate some inches above 
the ground. Over this she wears a garment reaching 
from the neck to the knee or a little above, like a 



68 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

cloak, only very loose and with very loose sleeves. 
You see women walking along the street with the 
sleeves of their outer garments so long that their 
hands are completely covered from view. They 
usually stick their arms out to the side rigidly and 
they look like stumps. I suppose it helps them to 
walk to thus use their arms, swinging them stiffly 
back and forth. The hair is done up in the back 
and ornaments are stuck through. When it is cold 
they have little strips of velvet ornamented with 
gold and silver-colored trifles, which are passed once 
around the forehead, the ends being somehow fas- 
tened in the back pug ; the top and back of the head 
are protected by the hair." 

Of a common experience he writes : " This after- 
noon I have had my first ride in a Sedan chair on the 
shoulders of men. This afternoon one of the Wes- 
leyan missionaries wanted Gage and me to go to 
their compound, which is in the heart of the native 
city, and attend a * covenant meeting,' as well as meet 
some of the Hunan missionaries of their mission. 
It is a long way and there was not much time, so we 
decided to go in these chairs. They are like little 
coops, closed on three sides and open at the front. 
Here you hang a screen or you can pull down a flap 
and hide yourself from sight and weather. The little 
box is hung between two poles and is carried on the 
shoulders of men. Three men usually go with each 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 69 

chair, two always bearing and one resting. Through 
the crowded street we went at a very fast walk. It 
would be almost impossible to keep up with these 
men without running, and they have to be calling 
out all the time in order to make room for themselves. 
Even then we hit against people and narrowly escape 
others all the time. Men and women in the street 
have to learn the art of stepping aside enough to let 
you pass and no further, at least they seem averse 
to doing anything more. We found ourselves in an 
ordinary Chinese street, as narrow and as dirty as 
usual. Filthy mud, stagnant water and waste ma- 
terial all about. Right out in the street (which might 
better be called a lane or alley) we saw a man lying ; 
he seemed to be living right there. Under him was 
a torn mattress of straw and around him were the 
remnants of food. There he crouched in a very un- 
comfortable attitude, nodding half-conscious over 
a dirty bowl. He looked sick; he might have been 
dying, but no one paid any attention to him. There 
is so much suffering and so much evil in China that 
people, even foreigners, get accustomed to it. On 
the one hand the natives do not show much of any 
pity for the sufferers, and on the other the suffer- 
ers do not feel that they are singled out and espe- 
cially deserving. We were making for a hill that runs 
through the centre of Hanyang. There are no dwell- 
ings on the hill as the people fear the dragon un- 



70 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

derneath, but strangely enough there are some gov- 
ernment barracks there : and there is almost always 
a temple. We passed through a swampy place on a 
walk which was built up above the level of the water 
and mud, and approached a tea-house." 

Of the weather in Hankow: "I understand now 
the words that I used to employ when people asked 
me what the weather was like here and I said, * Very 
damp and penetrating in winter. In summer — ' 
but of that in season ! But all these days it has been 
most unpleasant weather. The thermometer has not 
been so very low, but there is something in the atmos- 
phere which bores right into one. The air outside 
is heavy and damp; inside it is not much better. 
There has hardly been a room, during the cold snap, 
where you could not see your breath plainly. The 
walls and windows and floors are poorly made and 
do not keep the cold out as they should. The result 
is that in spite of open fires, which we have in almost 
all the rooms, and of my oil-stove, which is working 
overtime, the house is cold. I held out the first part 
of the winter pretty well, but have given in, from one 
grade of clothing to another, until now I am clad in 
the heaviest underclothing which I could find among 
my things and am wearing good flannel pajamas for 
the first time in my life. Of course the people suffer 
a great deal this weather. You see 'ricksha men, and 
other coolies, splashing through snow and slush with 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 71 

bare feet. Others bind straw and bits of burlap 
around their feet and take to the other parts of the 
body all the clothes which they can borrow, buy, or 
steal. The Chinese houses are of course very cold and 
the people simply get all they can out of their good 
things by putting on all their clothes and wearing 
them right along, until the cold snap lets up and the 
need is less. I think that the food they eat is not as 
good for them as that which we eat, as far as warming 
the system is concerned." 

Warren had great admiration for the physical 
energy of the Chinese, their industry, their devotion 
to those whom they serve, their marvellous patience 
and endurance of the inevitable, their desire to learn. 
He alludes from time to time to the sturdiness of 
their characters. At the same time his eyes were not 
shut to their sudden loss of temper, their vindictive- 
ness, their apparent want of sympathy with suffering 
man and beast. 

During that winter in Hankow, Warren sought 
good cheer in the companionship of others. His 
letters show unmistakably that separation from home, 
in a land so far off and so strange in customs and ways 
of living, was keenly felt by him. He was the last to 
admit homesickness, but he was the first to allow that 
he at times longed for an evening with the family. 

Among those whom he met at Hankow during that 
winter was Rev. Arthur M. Sherman, of the American 



72 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Church Mission. After Mr. Sherman had left the 
mission-field for a visit to his home in New Jersey, 
Warren wrote him: — 

"We are building lives, we are cultivating charac- 
ters, which are eternal ; we are ' holding property 
rights in human souls.' So all of this friendship, the 
commerce of good ideas, the interchange of appreci- 
ation and affection is well worth while. It helps him 
who gives and him who receives, for it makes moral 
fibre and endures forever. . . . To live in the appre- 
ciation of good and of its constant exercise is be- 
ginning the life eternal here and now, for we are 
putting into ourselves and others what makes for 
eternity, viz. the Good. It is said the judgments of 
time are inflexibly moral ; the evil is requited if time 
is given her way; nothing evil will endure forever. 
Only the good has a claim on the reaches of time, 
only thus can we ally ourselves inseparably with the 
march of men to * God, Who is our Home/ It is 
only cowardly for some of us, when we look ahead 
and allow a feeling of concern to come over us. It 
will be for the best ! I have been wonderfully guided 
and directed. Will HE desert me now ? All my ex- 
perience says * No,' but there is always a Voice of 
authority within, sometimes louder than the Mind's 
or the Will's. Let us be thankful for the past, happy 
in the present, calm in the promise of the future. 
Let us see if we cannot be, you and I. I will not give 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 73 

you a lot of messages to my friends at home. Tell 
them just how I am and that I love them all right 
well — better than ever. ' Out of sight, out of mind ' 
was a lonely man's remark, — or a pessimist's. I 
do not subscribe to it. And now, another farewell. 
With you go our best wishes ; our prayers will follow 
you on your journey. But my thoughts of you will be 
persistently running away to a friend whom I have 
come to love." 

After the great shock of Warren's sudden death, 
Mr. Sherman's letter, with its sad recital of detail, was 
the first to reach the stricken home. He writes : — 

" I thank God that I could call him — Friend. I 
love to think of dear Warren's splendid gifts and 
training put to splendid use in the new sphere of the 
larger life upon which he has so recently entered. . . . 
His buoyancy, his enthusiasm, his earnestness of 
purpose, his kindness, were contagious. Being with 
Warren was like marching to music, it made the 
march so much easier. He gave a spring to one. We 
might call it a strengthening — an uplift ; it is a qual- 
ity hard to define, but I know it was a wonderful and 
glorious thing. With it all there was that remarkable 
companionableness about him. He was such an 
inspiring friend ! During that winter in Hankow, in 
long walks and talks together, there came from him 
to me a stimulus which was invaluable. I especially 
felt this in my preaching ; he was helping me to make 



74 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

it stronger, clearer, more simple. His own mind 
was so clear that it helped me to think clearly. His 
thought was so strong that, after being with him, 
stimulated by his thought, clarified by his simplicity, 
it was easy to get to work on a sermon. Times with 
him were like times spent with the best books. I came 
away to do things. It was far better than books, for 
there was added the powerful element of person- 
ality. He had every qualification for a successful 
missionary, — spiritual power, adaptability, a talent 
for study and acquiring a difficult language, ripeness 
of judgment, the gift of drawing both Chinese and 
foreigners to himself by strong ties of respect, admira- 
tion, affection, by his ardor, courage, and humor. 
This last is not least. How many an hour it has 
lightened!" 

While a missionary in China the noble Griffith 
John cast longing eyes into Hunan, prophesying that 
some time that great Province would welcome Chris- 
tianity. In 1891 he wrote from his home in Hankow : 
"I believe that Hunan is to be opened and that I 
shall be in Changsha before I die." Two years later 
he received into his church ten Hunanese : — " and 
there are some fine fellows among them." During 
that year four of his own converts were in Changsha, 
sending back to Hankow encouraging accounts of the 
outlook for Christianity there. In the spring of 1901 
Dr. John grew restive under the delay to send out 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 75 

recruits for the field so ready for the harvester: 
"Again I do entreat you to send us men for Hunan. 
. . . Changsha must be occupied at once." During 
the early part of 1905 Warren called upon this opti- 
mistic patriarch and found him as earnest as ever to 
see Changsha provided with proper missionary forces, 
and in full sympathy with the spirit of the work Yale 
men were planning to do in that city. Warren de- 
scribes in one of his letters of this period a great meet- 
ing which Dr. John addressed with his well-known 
intensity, and how he appealed to young men to spare 
no pains to acquire the language: "He said he 
believed that we would live to see the time when not 
only education would have a firm hold upon the peo- 
ple of Hunan, but when English would be spoken 
by the officials and those of the common people who 
came into contact with the foreigner. The native 
press is awaking and instead of taking the hostile 
and rabid tone which the Hunan papers took previ- 
ous to the Boxer trouble, they are not only progress- 
ive but even tolerant. One of these papers, speak- 
ing of the fear which some of the natives entertain, 
that the introduction of the religion of the West 
would destroy the Chinese ideals of filial piety and 
patriotism, said recently: 'He that believes in 
Jesus and is not patriotic is not true to Jesus/ 
'The pulpit and the school are to become great 
forces as the old country opens its eyes and sees 



76 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the light of day coming over the hills of T'ang. 
China is waking up hungry.' ' These words of 
Dr. John's were spoken at a meeting during the 
Week of Prayer ; his hopes were about to be real- 
ized. The time had arrived for a forward move- 
ment into Hunan; the Yale Executive Committee 
urged it and the two men at the front favored it. 
It was decided that Warren should go up to Chang- 
sha in advance of Gage, reconnoitre and make a 
beginning. 

Warren was at this time quite up to his usual 
standard of good health and good cheer. He writes 
to a friend : " Think of me as busy and happy. It is 
a good old world for one who is willing to work and 
hungry to make friends. Could any better world be 
constructed for one who wanted to do good, than this 
one in which we live ? Every act we perform with the 
best we have in it unfits us for the old life. We enter 
the higher country which is better and whence the 
lowland looks lower than ever before, every time we 
rise. It is one of the privileges of my life to have gone 
out from America with a company of very faithful 
friends who will stand back of me and be true to 
me." 

To the home circle he writes : " Have I referred to 
the fact I am very well? My friends are disposed 
to make fun of me and Sherman had the effrontery 
to call me ' fat,' and, worse still, ' pudgy.' I wish you 



THE WINTER AT HANKOW 77 

would speak to him about it when he comes to see 
you ! It is n't right ! ! But I think I am correct in say- 
ing I never felt better in my life. I know I am right 
in saying I never weighed so much in my life. Un- 
less the Hankow scales are wrong, I weigh in the 
neighborhood of 157 pounds, which is pretty good 
for a half -fed, overworked, under-slept missionary ! 
But I am saying very little, for I know that the 
tropical summer is approaching and that the stron- 
gest of men feel the strain of such days. I am trying 
to keep as well as I can be and hope to make it last 
as long as I can. And who knows but that I shall be 
better here in China than I would have been had I 
remained at home." 

In the same letter, with all the hope of a great 
work before him, joyous and yet reflective, he writes : 
"Surely through all the years I have been wonder- 
fully led and prepared for this work and you rejoice 
with me in my growing joy. I could not feel it so 
much at home, for there was much between and very 
much unseen which caused me to hesitate. I tried 
to be satisfied with the present and not set so much 
by the future. This led me to appear even unhappy, 
but I think it was only trying to be perfectly honest 
and clear-sighted in the thing. I did not feel sure 
enough of myself, and the work, and the place, and 
the people, to be on the qui vive all the time. But I 
was led to poke along and here I am, glad that I kept 



78 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

at it and that so large a work is before me. Pray, 
as I do, that I may have the strength to take it up 
as I should and not prove a disappointment to those 
who look to me to do my part." 



VII 

CHANGSHA — THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 

On the east bank of the Hsiang River, two hundred 
miles south of Hankow, lies the walled city of Chang- 
sha. The Province of Hunan, of which it is the chief 
city, has an area nearly twice the size of New York 
state, with a population of nearly 21,000,000. It is 
connected with Hankow by river service, but the 
day is not far distant when, by the completion of 
the railway, it will be possible to reach that city in 
five hours, Canton in eight, Peking in twenty-four. 
Changsha has a population of 192,000. It is the 
centre of a Province regarded as the most intelligent 
in the Empire, a larger number of officials for gov- 
ernment service coming from this than from any 
other province. The anti-foreign spirit has always 
been intense in this inland, exclusive region, refus- 
ing all alliance with the non-Chinese world. The 
awakening of China has reached Hunan and grad- 
ually she is swinging into line with the rest of the 
Empire in commercial, social, industrial, and edu- 
cational advancement. 

The various missionary societies in Hunan, feeling 
that there should be an unsectarian college in its chief 
city, invited the Yale Mission to locate there. This 



80 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

should be an institution of a popular character, should 
establish and work out the problem of higher educa- 
tion, "in science, art and medicine," and consider 
"the question of theological education," also. Those 
sending this broad and somewhat awing invitation 
heartily welcomed "the prospect of having Univer- 
sity Extension and special work for the literati carried 
on in Hunan." No suggestion was made in this 
formal letter of invitation as to the amount of time 
required for the development of these ideals. 

In accepting the invitation the Yale Missionary 
Society declared its purpose: (1) To furnish a com- 
pany of missionaries who are strongly and sincerely 
Christian as well as men technically fitted for educa- 
tional work ; (2) To assist China in her great need by 
raising up through such an institution a body of 
native students acquainted with the truths, and 
accepting the spirit, of Christianity ; by training these 
men as effectively as possible in scientific and ad- 
vanced studies to become leaders in their own coun- 
try; and by reproducing in the Far East the whole- 
some moral and social influences of an American 
college community; (3) To cooperate with the mis- 
sionaries of other societies in unifying and making 
effective the Christian schools of the Province so that 
they may be of the highest service to the church and 
may become an object lesson to the government 
schools in the country. 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 81 

On the 15th of February, 1905, Warren left Han- 
kow, en route for "the promised land." There was 
much hurry and confusion, delay and dickering over 
the question of rates and accommodations, before he 
got fairly started. He was too early in the season for 
the regular Changsha boats and was compelled to 
put up with a second-class steamer, if worthy of the 
name, which in his amusing way he designates, " The 
noble Queen of the River, 'T'son Pau.' ' It was 
a long, clumsy, flat-bottomed affair, with narrow 
passageways: "So here I am, the only foreigner on 
the ship, writing on my typewriter to the great inter- 
est of a constantly shifting but always gazing public. 
I never was such a popular writer as I am at this 
moment. Both the windows on the port side are full 
of Chinese heads, eyes watching with wonderment 
this novel proceeding. There is no danger of violence 
and the only fear is that, if I do not watch constantly, 
they will quietly appropriate some little thing which 
lies close at hand. My boy is a treasure; he is un- 
spoiled, that is, he does not know all the tricks of steal- 
ing your butter and selling it, attaching small orna- 
ments and coins; spending all the time he can in 
unadulterated laziness, or in total absence from the 
premises. He was on the boat nearly all the time 
yesterday at Hankow and, so far as I know, had no- 
thing to eat until eight o'clock in the evening. He not 
only would not touch anything until I had partaken, 



82 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

but had even brought three loaves of bread and had 
almost forced me to take two of them. If he continues 
as well as he has begun and seems as willing and as 
industrious in a couple of months as he does now 
(when there is nothing to do) he will be a fine boy 
and I shall hold on to him, trying not to spoil him, 
which is very easy out here." 

The journey of two days up the Yangtse, across 
the eastern portion of Tung-ting Lake and up the 
Hsiang River brought him to his long-looked-for 
haven. 

Changsha at last, Feb. 19, 1905. 

" Here I am in the city about which we have thought 
and talked so much ever since the Yale people decided 
that the Mission should be established here. The 
circumstances of my arrival were not of the pleasant- 
est nature and, as I look back over the last three days, 
the scenes which come up before my mind are not 
altogether the most engaging. And yet I did not seem 
to mind the trip so much while I was en route. I be- 
came restless in such small quarters and grew very 
weary of the faces which could not be avoided but 
seemed to be omnipresent. At last we neared the city 
for which I had been straining my eyes all the after- 
noon. On the right of the river there was a mountain 
and one or two smaller hills indistinctly visible through 
clouds of moisture. Nearer to us on the same side 
there was a long island inhabited by a few people in 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 83 

mud huts. On the left was the city straggling up 
over a slowly rising hill. Nothing very distinct about 
the landscape, partly because of the veil of mist and 
fine rain, and partly because there seemed to be 
nothing bright in color to relieve the dirty brown of 
mud houses and walls. There were many Chinese 
boats close together with their bows run up on to the 
bank of the river. As we approached, the shore be- 
came alive with men putting out in their ' sampans ' 
(native boats) to convey passengers ashore. I left 
my boy to guard my things while I went ashore with 
the Customs officer who had come on board. And 
so I got my first view of the interior of the city where 
I expect to spend so much of my life hereafter. It 
was a miry and disagreeable day, but even under 
such untoward circumstances the prospect was far 
from discouraging to the newcomer. 

" We were told by Mr. Beach that the streets are 
wide, and so they are. Not noticeably like Common- 
wealth Avenue, to be sure, but nevertheless straight 
and regular, more evenly and carefully paved, more 
open above with fewer of those upper stories that jut 
out and shut out the light. And the stores have a 
more distinguished appearance, as if the people are 
well-to-do and have more self-respect than those in 
the more foreign places. In front of many of the 
stores there are little balconies raised a foot or so 
above the level of the street on which the proprietor 



84 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

and his friends can watch the passers-by. Strangely 
enough the people and the shops which I saw re- 
minded me more of pictures of Chinatown at the 
World's Fair than of other parts of China which I have 
seen. I think that this is because this city is more 
Chinese, more typical of the people and more illus- 
trative of the better and cleaner life than Hankow or 
Shanghai. This is a bit early to be making such gen- 
eral statements, but these are the impressions made 
upon me as I see the place for the first time. Yester- 
day was the fifteenth of the first Chinese month, which 
marks the end of the New Year proper. There were 
fireworks and fire-crackers galore all along the shore 
and in the house-boats, where whole families and 
their many relatives live the year round. The ex- 
pense of real estate is thus debarred from their ac- 
counts." 

A week later he writes: "I have been more and 
more impressed these days with the appearance of 
these people, and their dwellings and their mode of 
living, so far as I have been able to observe it. The 
streets are not clean in this weather ; it would not be 
China if they were. Over the stone flagging of the 
streets there is a wash of black mud all the time. But 
they are wider, more substantial, and freer from dirt 
than those in Hankow. The people also seem supe- 
rior. They are, as a rule, better looking, healthier, 
happier than those in the lower cities. They are more 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 85 

robust and you see fewer of the horrible beggars. 
There is more self-respect and independence re- 
flected in the faces of the people you meet ; an air 
of prosperity, an impression of solidity and strength. 
You find here neither that grovelling servility, nor 
ill-concealed dislike which is often observed in the 
lower cities. There are very rich families here, quite 
independent of all the foreigner can bring and they 
are not loath to show it. . . .1 have been struck with 
the faces of some of the commonest laborers on the 
street; they appear happy and self-respecting." 

To acquire a piece of land for the new Yale was 
regarded from the outset a most desirable end to be 
gained. It would give to the enterprise a visible form 
and produce the impression that the Yale men who 
were seen on the street and met in a social way were 
in Changsha for a distinct purpose, and this purpose 
was always foremost in Warren's mind. Into every 
reasonable endeavor to secure this coveted prize he 
entered with all his heart. It suited one of his notice- 
able characteristics, his love of acquisition. There 
was in him an active and aggressive energy, directed 
towards the accomplishment of visible ends. He 
always hoped to realize the material, the palpable, 
the adequate, the purposeful. He had a vast deal of 
push for others, little " pull " for himself. The esti- 
mate of his administrative ability, as expressed to a 
friend before leaving home, was in a measure justi- 



86 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

fied on the field : " I shall not be a great educator 
nor a profound student. If I am not mistaken I shall 
be of use in the political and other relations of the 
college as I come into contact with various classes of 
men." 

As he came up the Hsiang on that gloomy morning 
in February, he looked to right and left to see if there 
was not some site suitable for the college buildings. 
He knew well the difficulties in the way ; yet he cher- 
ished the confident belief that this cardinal end 
might be gained early in his work. In company with 
one or more of the Yale force, he made many an 
excursion into the country around Changsha. There 
was always a leading question in his mind : " Will 
this site allow a campus?" His letters invariably 
refer to some new locality visited, or some new obsta- 
cle raised. Certain spots became very familiar to his 
home friends, as "the Red Hill," and "the Soldiers' 
Camp." 

"Never before in my life," he writes, "have I 
thought that in any way I could sympathize with 
Christopher Columbus! But the experiences of the 
last few weeks, during which I have been faithfully 
* looking for land,' have given me a sense of comrade- 
ship with the man! Finding land in China, which 
shall be suitable for a young Yale, is no easy matter. 
These people are the most economical folk in the 
world ; nothing goes to waste. The multiplication of 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 87 

industries and the division of labor, which you see 
here, force upon you the seriousness of life. The 
struggle for existence is a bitter one, indeed. The 
land, the cultivation of which stands at the basis of 
life, shows the effect of this struggle. The low lands 
are covered with rice swamps, and terraces run up 
the valleys until they come just below the level of 
some small pond, the water from which flows from 
one field to the next and makes them all irregular 
plots of mud, with the rice plants under the surface. 
The low hills are inhabited by the dead. Some of the 
low hills, out to the east of the city, are simply pep- 
pered with mounds and stones. The higher land is 
usually too steep for good building sites, and almost 
every lot has one or more of the omnipresent graves. 
These resting-places of the dead have a religious sig- 
nificance, and to buy a piece of property and build, 
regardless of the fact that you are on a grave-yard, 
is to act in violence to the religious sensibilities of 
the people and to invite trouble. The reason why 
the higher land is not so thickly populated is that 
each grave must be well placed, the ' wind and water ' 
of the location must be such as to insure the dead 
against all disturbance from these elements. Hills 
are too much exposed to insure peace and comfort. 
Yet we have found that it is always impossible to 
find a piece of property which has not its share of 
graves, and it is our final conclusion that we must 



88 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

go ahead and get our land and then reckon the cost 
of handling these previous occupants. 

" The theory of land ownership in China is that all 
land belongs to the Government. Any man may go 
and settle down on a piece of property which is put at 
his disposal by the Government as a loan. When he 
wishes to leave this holding he asks a money con- 
sideration from another man who wants to live there, 
covering the improvements which he has made. But 
at any time the Government can take for its own 
uses any land which it likes. A case in point hap- 
pened not long ago, when a space a mile square was 
cleared right out of the heart of a thickly populated 
city, not far from here, for a palace. The hills and 
mountains have not been so much in favor with the 
natives as they are not adapted to rice culture, the 
main product in this part of China. So it is that the 
larger eminences are held by the Government. When 
it comes to obtaining a piece of land and indications 
point to its being in the hands of private parties, it is 
important to find out very quietly who the owners 
are and what they think about sale. It is of the ut- 
most importance to keep dark the intelligence that 
foreigners are interested. Some of the Chinese will 
not sell to foreigners and they are all given over to 
the policy of squeezing all they can out of him. The 
owners of the property tell the middle-man (as the 
agent is called) what price is wanted, whereupon 



MSEST-i 




SEABURY AND GAGE STARTING ON ONE OF THEIR QUESTS 
FOR LAND 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 89 

you authorize him to offer in return about a tenth of 
the exorbitant figure named. Slowly the other par- 
ties come down and you gradually go up until a com- 
promise is made, but your identity is not revealed until 
the whole is settled and the money on the point of 
being paid. Even then the Chinese sometimes will 
go back on their word, when they find that a for- 
eigner wants to buy and is about to have his want 
met. 

"If it is land belonging to the Government, it is 
often possible to get it at a cheaper figure. But there 
are the graves. In some places it is possible to arrange 
with the officials to have the graves removed at so 
much per head. The money is paid to them and they 
arrange with the various parties interested; many 
exhibit a most surprising and zealous interest at this 
moment! When it is a piece of private land, arrange- 
ments in regard to graves must be made with the 
owners and families directly. 

" On this side of the city to the South where the 
land rises to some bluffs close to the water, on the 
islands opposite the city and along the other side, I 
have roamed in search of possible places for our 
future home. There are not many good sites, for the 
land is either too flat and low, or it rises up too ab- 
ruptly into little rounded hills which do not offer 
enough room for such a plant as we want to put 
up." 



90 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Warren estimated that during the first month he 
was in Changsha he travelled over one hundred miles 
in search of land : " One gets up on the big mountain 
opposite the city and looks out to see other moun- 
tains in every direction, fading away into dimness 
on the sky-line. Most of them are not higher than 
the lower eminences of the White Mountains, say 
Cannon Mountain, but they are almost all of them 
smooth in appearance, arising from the fact that 
there are not many trees on them and the natives go 
over them and pick up every stick and even cut down 
the dry grass for fuel. Trees are protected by their 
owners when they do not need them for building or 
burning. But there is a fine mountain with tall trees 
on its side opposite, which is sacred and so ensured 
against axe or sickle." 

Upon his arrival at Changsha Warren made his 
home with Mr. and Mrs. Gotteberg, of the Norwe- 
gian Mission, whose whole-souled hospitality won 
his heart. That he might not be a burden to them 
he subsequently began housekeeping on his own 
account : — 

"To-morrow I set up for myself. For a week I 
have been buying pots and kettles, fuel and food, 
and still my * boy ' says I have n't sufficient. I never 
before took any interest in this department of the 
world's industry. Now alas ! I must buy brooms, 
wood and coal, send the boy after chickens, which he 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 91 

brings home alive, tied together with a string and 
left to hop about until he wants them. I must put 
down in my book all these pennies which I so 
domestically spend. It is not romantic and you 
do not think of yourself in the light of a hero, 
when you are counting the sticks of wood which you 
bought at seven cash (f of a cent) per stick. My little 
boy is tremendously in earnest and his eyes shine 
with delight at the prospect of running a kitchen. 

"My supper of curry and rice, cocoa, bread and 
butter, marmalade, prunes, and cake, being finished, 
I have come into this room where I live most of the 
time, and, stretching myself out in my Morris chair, 
read the ' Outlook.' Not such a picture of hardship 
and sacrifice, is it ? Last night I went out to dinner 
and wore a Tuxedo ; think of doing such an impious 
thing ! A missionary having good clothes and having 
the immodesty to wear them out to a dinner, whereat 
he forgets the seriousness of life and puts away good 
food! I am afraid that you are ashamed of me. 
Don't let this get into the printed columns of ' Life 
and Light for Woman,' or that yellow journal, ' The 
Dayspring,' which we used to pore over on Sunday 
afternoons. But I was about to say that I came home 
to my bachelor quarters and sat down before the open 
fire, feeling very much like one of these young Eng- 
lishmen you read about in books, Sir Peanut Brittle, 
R. A., or Mr. Remington Typewriter, M. P. For my 



92 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

boy came in and pulled out my slippers from under 
the bed and tried to look intelligent while I put them 
on, as he had nothing else to do at the time. And you 
would laugh to see me eat. I am taking my meals in 
a little room next to this, whither the boy brings all 
the food from the kitchen. He is very proud of his 
culinary skill and is very much delighted when I like 
the cuisine. But yesterday, the first day in this pil- 
grimage across the deserts of housekeeping, we had 
soup; it was a curiosity. There was milk in it and 
tapioca, also, and what else I know not. This morn- 
ing, after indulging in an orange, some oatmeal, part 
of the hen which I bored into and excavated a little 
yesterday, and some coffee, he pressed me to indulge 
in some of his tapioca pudding, but although I come 
from the group of states where they are reported 
to have pie for breakfast, I gently but firmly refused. 
But the fellow is doing well and is working so hard 
that to-day he told me he had no time for his break- 
fast. I hope he does n't work so hard that I lose mine 
in the melee." 

Early in March he was invited by the Changsha 
Board of Education to teach English in a large na- 
tive school. He looked at the matter from a practical 
point of view, considering well its bearing on the 
work of the future, the impression he might make on 
the gentry and on the broad-minded men interested 
in all the good things the people are interested in. 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 93 

He wished the leader of the school to understand that 
he was not one whose time could be easily given to 
this outside work and a good compensation would be 
expected. He stipulated that he should not teach the 
rudiments of the language, as he says : " It will give 
us the respect of the teachers and scholars to know 
that I am not a cheap man, and later, when we open 
our own school, there will be a healthy respect for 
the foreign teacher who helped the native school for 
a few months and was well paid for his time.' , 

A fortnight later he writes of his new position: 
" I have had my first experience in teaching in China. 
My professional career has commenced and that too 
in a Chinese school. I am to go two mornings a week 
and stay two hours with ten minutes' intermission 
between sessions. The authorities of * The Bright 
Virtue School ' sent a chair for me last Friday morn- 
ing. Here in Changsha these chairs are usually borne 
by three men, one in front between parallel poles, 
one in the rear, and one close up to the little covered 
box in which you sit; the weight comes directly on 
the shoulders of the men. Through the city we went 
in the rain, the coolies wearing big bamboo hats 
covered with oiled paper. People in the way are in- 
formed of our approach by constant calling from the 
bearers. It is a much safer method of transportation 
than are our faster means at home, such as the auto- 
mobile. No danger of being run over; no need of 



94 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

policemen at the crossings. In and out we wend our 
way, trying to keep the middle of the street as much 
as possible, but often stopping to avoid collisions. 
When near the North Gate the men suddenly turned 
to the left down a narrow alley with one-story white- 
fronted houses close to you on either side. Through 
this alley we wound for a few minutes until there was 
a little open space and we saw an artificial pond on 
the left. We went up a few steps and the chair was 
lowered in a covered gate-house. His scrubbiness, 
the dean of the institution, appeared and ushered me 
along an open passageway (open on both sides and 
roofed in) to a little room more thinly and temporarily 
constructed than our Camp Asquam buildings, where 
there was a small dining-room table and a few tea- 
cups. He was surprised to hear that I could speak 
a little of his language, upon which he complimented 
me, I of course politely insisting that my knowledge 
was very limited (which, by the way, is true). Soon 
a couple of young teachers came in who speak Eng- 
lish and I soon went to my class-room. Meanwhile it 
was very unpleasant to glance up and see boys look- 
ing in at the window, to discover what the foreigner 
looked like. I don't believe that there is anything like 
what we call discipline, promptness, or order in the 
school. My recitation began about half an hour late 
and I found that the time which they were following 
in a general way was that much behind mine and the 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 95 

right time. At once rid your minds of pictures which 
rise to view when the word ' school ' is used. Don't 
think of Harvard or of Yale. Don't think of the Ded- 
ham High. Remember that the people in this Prov- 
ince all live on the ground floor. And the school 
buildings are all as near the lap of the old lady as they 
can get. Most of the rooms have nothing between 
your feet and the ground but a layer of cement or 
beaten clay. So in passing from room to room you 
go, not up in the elevator or down the winding stairs, 
but first of all you go out-of-doors and then you pass 
along under this covered corridor until you come 
around to your destination. It is all more or less 
out-of-doors, for there is no heat in the rooms, the 
walls are very thin, some with poorly constructed 
glass windows, but mostly fret- work covered with 
paper. The light comes in fairly well, and the wind 
is not outdone. When it is raining outside (has been 
for weeks and bids fair to keep bravely up for weeks 
to come) these rooms with the earth floors do not 
remind one of those hot front parlors in small houses 
where the minister calls, with the perspiration run- 
ning down his neck and forcing him 'to move on to 
the next,' sooner than he had planned. These boys 
whom I am to teach have had two years of English, 
but are not very proficient in the tongue. What they 
want from me is the ability to talk in English. None 
of their teachers can do that as well as I, so I am 



96 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

to read to them, talk to them, have them read to me 
and so keep the English words perpetually dinning in 
their ears. It will be interesting work and may help 
us in our school later on. Let us hope so and pray 
so." 

A little later he writes : " The boys are very much 
interested and are all anxious to learn. I will enclose 
a sample of the composition which they do. In a few 
weeks one cannot accomplish much except teach a 
number of new words and certain principles of pro- 
nunciation, insisting especially on those sounds which 
seem to be constitutionally difficult for this race. 
Following I will copy a couple of essays on 'The 
Whale.' " 

WALE 

The wale is the larger kind of the fish and his power 
is so highter that all the fish live in water are con- 
troled by him. But he difference all the fish for he no 
gills or fins for it is hard when he turns in the water 
and in few very minutes he cannot appears in the air 
that he might died. As for his spout can he wrecks 
the smaller vessels and the fishing smacks, the people 
of the river's bank almost always distressed by him. 

WHALE 

Some animals in water are lived chiefly by the fish. 
The different kinds of fish are very much. As the 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 97 

whale is especially with other. If we catch a fish to 
lay down at the ground it will not take long that 
which is soon to die. Why ? Because all fish cannot 
live on land to inspire the air. But the whale can be 
inspiring the air and drinking the water also. He 
often inspires the air going down to the bottom of 
water by and by rise up against to spit the air so high 
that almost thirty feet away. He has no gil but has 
a large mouse. When our traveled ship must take 
care and don't sail into his mouse. Thus the whale 
is a king of fish. 

Nearly a month after Warren's arrival in Chang- 
sha he thought it well to lay before His Excellency 
Tuan Fang, Governor, the purposes of the Yale 
Mission College. In this aggressive move the young 
missionary relied upon the Governor's well-known 
liberal views regarding Western civilization. Having 
secured the good offices of Mr. Zau, interpreter in 
English, he was able to overcome a supposed pre- 
judice the Governor had against missionaries, not 
because he was opposed to them specifically, but 
because he was jealously watched by the old conserva- 
tive party. The Governor agreed to see Warren, who, 
at the appointed hour, was borne in his chair to the 
official residence, through long, alley-like corridors 
and heavy gates with grotesque figures painted upon 
them. He was carried through various courts, open 



98 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

to the sky, having buildings on four sides, then he 
was ushered into the guest-hall for Chinese, with its 
low couch on which there was room for two to squat. 
Around the wall were chairs and tables for guests 
of less prominence: "We soon heard the Governor 
slowly approaching; the servants held back the cur- 
tain for him; he entered. He is a man of ordinary 
height, whose sparse beard and foreign glasses give 
him quite a solemn and dignified appearance. He 
seemed rather portly, but aside from the fact that 
these officials live pretty well and never take any 
exercise, of course there is the amount of clothing to 
be reckoned with. After shaking hands silently and 
delicately we sat down, he at the head of the table and 
I on his right. He wore his official hat, which is like 
a saucer with the edge turned back, making a flat 
perpendicular surface around the edge. This was 
lined with fur and there was a stiff plume sticking 
out behind. He wore heavy silks brocaded with de- 
signs and around his neck were several strings of 
beads. I told him about the plan of the Mission and 
he seemed interested, but there was always a stolid 
coldness about the face, and when he looked at you 
straight his eyes were very penetrating. He soon sent 
a servant (there were three or four of them with a 
soldier or two going in and out of the room) after 
something which proved to be an embroidered silk 
case with a small bottle of snuff in one side and an 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 99 

ivory plate in the other, on which he turned out a 
little from time to time and applied it to his nose. 
He was very strong on the idea of our establishing 
a school which should turn out men who are fitted 
for the highest service here in China. Many of the 
schools under the direction of foreigners get many 
pupils, but they graduate unfit to take a stand with 
their fellows in public places and in Chinese society 
as well as in Chinese scholarship. These are impor- 
tant points and I pressed His Excellency to more 
clearly set forth what he had in mind, which he did. 
It was not a long interview but a very pleasant one, 
and His Excellency asked me to come again, saying 
he would be glad to help us. How far this will go we 
don't of course know and cannot depend on it much. 
But some day we may have a chance to remind him 
of his promise. He came out into the court with us 
and there I attempted to make the Oriental bow, 
which I had made very well here at home. But it did 
not seem to please His Excellency, who good-humor- 
edly showed how the contortion should be executed. 
Then with Zau I went to a restaurant near by, where 
we had an excellent lunch, all in foreign style, well 
cooked, and well served, — and then home." 

Prince Tsai Chen, son of Prince Ching, the prime 
minister, on a visit to New York in the year 1902, 
received special attention from J. B. Reynolds, Esq., 
Yale 1884, in the absence of Mayor Low, to whom 



100 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

he was secretary. When Mr. Reynolds visited China, 
on his world tour, he carried with him a beautiful 
Tiffany cup as a gift to the Prince, who, in turn, 
received him with gracious ceremony and feted him 
richly. Through Prince Ching, Mr. Reynolds re- 
ceived a letter of introduction to Tuan Fang, Gov- 
ernor of the Province of Hunan. Mr. Reynolds's 
prestige preceded him at Changsha, where he was 
received with marked favor by the Governor, who 
promised Mr. Reynolds to take an interest in the 
American College. 

Warren gave a hearty welcome to Mr. Reynolds, 
a member of the Yale Foreign Missionary Council: 
" A finely cultured gentleman and a delightful com- 
panion." He conducted him to various localities, 
possible sites for the College, and finally to the moun- 
tain on the opposite side of the river, from which a 
fine view may be gained of the city and surrounding 
country. Then he took him to call on the Governor: 
" It was quite grand as we went through the middle 
doors of the yamen, which swung open for us, and 
were carried in our chairs through one little court and 
then another and finally let down in the ' chair court/ 
Gathering ourselves together for a final plunge we 
passed through blue doors where stood soldiers at 
* present arms,' and then out into another little court, 
and finally into the room where the Governor receives 
foreigners. We wanted to have Mr. Reynolds give 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 101 

His Excellency an account of our work, but the call 
was foreshortened by the Governor's invitation to 
come to lunch to-day." 

Of that interesting function Warren writes : " The 
lunch which the Governor gave us was an event which 
we shall long remember. It was really in honor of our 
attractive friend, Mr. Reynolds, but we were glad 
enough to creep in on any ' pull ' which could do the 
work. As on the other visit we went in our chairs and 
passed in at the swinging middle doors at what might 
be called the outer gate, passed along an open court, 
and were lowered in the chair court. Other doors 
were thrown open, giving us a view through another 
open court of the Chinese guest-room with its open 
front. But you must not imagine that there was any- 
thing very imposing about it for one who has read 
about the pomp and splendor of the East. The whole 
place, as I have said, is rather dilapidated, and, like 
the lady in the comic song, it has seen its best days. 
Through groups of soldiers and attendants we were 
shown into the dining-room where we found the 
Governor. There were two other Americans, both 
engineers, and one a Yale man in the class of '01, 
Sheff . In addition to them there were two Taotais 
(or big officials) and two interpreters. We stood 
around and talked for a while and the Governor 
seemed quite informal. Then we were shown our 
seats. There were ten of us. At one end sat His 



102 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Excellency and at the other one of the Taotais. I sat 
at the latter's right and Mr. Reynolds at the Gov- 
ernor's right, while Gage graced his left. The officials 
were relieved by their servants of their heavy court 
hats with their stiff horse-hair plumes sticking out 
behind, and the ordinary black skull cap with the red 
button was placed there instead. We were more at 
home than our hosts. The big fat Taotai on my left 
was much interested in the various articles as they 
appeared and tried to fathom their nature by using 
the sense of smell along with the use of his fork and 
knife. These latter instruments looked very awkward 
in his big hands and he had to wrestle with the viands 
as they came along. The food was very good ; I will 
send you the menu. 

" Mr. Reynolds offered to take any message to the 
son of the Governor, who is studying in Washington. 
The Governor seemed quite pleased and sent around 
the next day a wooden box, fully four feet long and 
two wide, with two smaller ones, half as big, one con- 
taining an embroidery for his guest and a picture 
of His Excellency. But in a way the kind-hearted 
American was repaid, for the Governor bought the 
tickets on the steamer for Mr. Reynolds, covered all 
the furniture in the room with white cloth, had flow- 
ers put on the table, and sent down two of his suite to 
bid him farewell. So I felt as if I belonged to royalty 
at the steamer, in the midst of all this favor." 



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THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 103 

Changsha, July 9, 1905. 

"We are now seeing China as she is in summer. 
Many of the coolies wear broad-brimmed straw hats 
which turn up in front and back. The hats do not 
come down on to the head as ours do, but there is a 
sort of straw collar, which fits the head like a crown, 
on top of which the hat is tied, which is to give ven- 
tilation. A more picturesque kind of hat is also of 
straw, but it is open-work and is backed with blue 
cloth, which looks very pretty about the dark face of a 
coolie. Every one, who has a hand disengaged, carries 
a fan and a good proportion of the race is bare to the 
waist. Some of the children spend the summer with- 
out the inconvenience of clothing, but the popular 
dress is a kind of apron which is split, one side being 
tied around each small ankle. It comes halfway up 
the breast, has a little string around the waist, and 
another over the shoulder, and is open in back. You 
pass a prosperous store, a silk shop or a silver shop, 
and there behind the counter is a row of men fanning 
themselves. 

" Thus far I have been able to wear a shirt with a 
coat, although I lay the latter aside when I am work- 
ing. I have also been able to keep my teacher half a 
day and do not find it bad studying with him. The 
people at night take out bamboo couches into the 
street in front of their houses and sleep there, or they 
go up to the platform which almost every Chinese 



104 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

house in the city has at the top of the structure for 
drying clothes, where they find air if there is any to be 
found. The people run great risks in this weather by 
eating fresh fruit ; it lays them open to the contracting 
of cholera. Watermelons, most of them of a whitish 
color and nearly round, peaches, plums and the like 
are eaten even unripe by a great many, then you see 
what is left thrown around the streets and allowed to 
remain there for weeks. The people do not work any 
harder than they have to, and they drink warm tea 
with other quieting mixtures of uncertain origin and 
very dubious appearance. We expect rain soon and 
a little diversion like that will set us all up on our feet 
again for another spell." 

Mr. Greenwell Fletcher, British Commissioner of 
Customs, whose residence was on the long, narrow 
island opposite Changsha, arranged with Warren to 
spend his nights with him. He returned to his work 
in the city each morning, delving into the language, 
which was a distinct gain to him, although pursu- 
ing such a study in midsummer was in no sense a 
pastime. Writing from his quarters at Mr. Gotte- 
berg's, he says : " I have slept on the roof of the house 
over on the island with no shelter above my head save 
the top of the mosquito netting. The wind comes 
through nicely and it is fine being up there behind 
the iron palings, with the lights along the river to the 
East, the big mountain towering gauntly aloft to the 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 105 

West and the stars closing in all around you above. 
No better air than that." 

His friend Fletcher has written : " During the whole 
of our intimacy, whether at home or journeying, — 
for I, among others, was with him on the walking 
tour he took to Paoking and Yungchow, — working 
or playing, for many are the consultations we have 
had over the former, and many the hard-fought 
battles on the tennis ground, whatever the occupa- 
tion, indeed, in which he was engaged, I never found 
him other than a strong, helpful, and cheery friend, 
whose good example was to be relied on and who was 
to be trusted for good advice and action in any diffi- 
culty. It seems inexplicably sad that a man so in- 
tellectually and physically gifted, who, moreover, 
was energetically and unselfishly using his great 
talents in the service of the good cause, — a man, in- 
deed, for whom I felt the greatest admiration and of 
whom I often think as a model of all that is pure and 
devoted, yet manly and charming withal, — should 
be cut off in his prime, before he had had time to 
delight more than a limited circle of acquaintances 
with his personality." 

The summer nights in a city, with its narrow 
streets, its unsanitary ways of living and its inhuman 
practices, brought much sadness to a nature as sensi- 
tive as Warren's. He writes of the sounds that reach 
his ears as he lies awake, trying to coax sleep : " One 



106 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

would get a very fair introduction into Chinese life 
if he could be transported by night to some high 
tower, there to listen to the sounds that rise from the 
narrow streets and closely packed houses below. 
Sleeping in such a tower, open on all sides to the winds 
of heaven and the noises of earth, I have lain and lis- 
tened to the strange night life as it is revealed in the 
vocal strains arising from the wide stretch below. 
One night the first sound that caught my ear was 
the voice of a little child steadily crying. There was 
something desolate and hopeless in her moan (for I 
concluded that it was a little girl), as if she were try- 
ing to bear her fate, but could not help telling the 
story of her pain by these constant sobs. I thought 
I knew all about her. Her mother had been tighten- 
ing the bandages around the little feet that evening 
and now they pained her worse than ever. She could 
not sleep, so there she lay and sobbed in that sub- 
dued but unbroken wail. Perhaps her mother was 
holding her and was trying to quiet her by telling her 
that, if her feet were allowed to grow big, she would 
never be happy and never get married. She might 
even have to be sold as a slave girl, for nobody cares 
about slave girls, whether they are attractive or not. 
All about the streets you see them, these women with 
their little pointed feet, like a deer's feet, and their 
swollen ankles, slowly stumping along. It is an ex- 
ception to see a woman with big feet. . . . The city 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 107 

is waking from its hot sleep. The upright boards 
along the store fronts are being taken down one by 
one, thus disturbing the vagrants who have been 
sleeping on a piece of straw matting in the street or 
on a little platform close under the front of the store. 
Beggars crawl out from this end and that corner. 
Sounds of trade are stirring. The streets are begin- 
ning to fill and another day is on. Still, in a nook or 
the shade of a hospitable door, tired forms remain 
unmoved and weary eyes remain closed in the midst 
of the hum about them. It is marvelous how these 
people can sleep, on a board, or on a piece of matting 
laid on the stones of a courtyard, or in the street, 
unprotected from the sun. They squat until they 
are sitting on their heels and then, resting their heads 
on their hands supported from the knees, they glide 
into dreamland. Sometimes standing up against a 
counter or a wall or sitting against some support, 
they are around you on all sides, and in the busy street 
you have to avoid unconscious figures enjoying their 
siestas." 

July 16. 
" Because I never have felt the cold much of any I 
thought that I might be very sensitive to the heat. 
But thus far I have not felt it as much as these old 
birds who have been out here for years. They say 
that one's resistance breaks down in time. How this 
may be I don't know, but most rules are subject to 



108 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the individual condition of the people. I have played 
tennis on the average of about twice a week, singles 
and doubles. This young Englishman, with whom I 
am staying, is fairly good and often wins a set off of 
me, but I continue to be the champion of some twenty- 
one millions here in the Province ! The sun is hot, but 
we don't play until five or later in the afternoon; it 
is hot enough then, but I like it. The perspiration 
runs down my arm until my hand is just soaked and 
the handle of the racket feels like a warm mud-pud- 
dle. I think that I have never gotten so hot as I have 
this summer. 

" I have one or two theories which I am testing grad- 
ually ; one is that people put on too many clothes in the 
winter. They expect to feel the cold and as a result 
they do feel it. I think that the same principle is 
true of the summer and that people make too many 
concessions to the heat, wearing too thin clothing 
and thinking about the weather too much. I also 
think that the person with plenty to do does not feel 
the heat so much as one who makes it his chief 
business to keep cool. But I realize that it is a bit 
early in the game to make sweeping generalities." 

Writing September 10, Warren says: "There is 
something in the air to-day that is suggestive of old 
days. The skies are overshadowed and threaten rain, 
but there is a cool wind blowing and for the first 
time in months I have gone through the day not in 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 109 

ducks and other thin things but in regular fabrics. 
Suggestions of open fires, of doors that let in gusts of 
unruly wind when they are opened, of hot biscuit 
and cocoa for supper, come to mind. The fall is here 
and our fears of another hot spell have vanished." 

Warren greatly enjoyed the companionship of the 
British Consul, Mr. A. J. Flaherty, with whom he 
had many a good game of tennis. 

After Warren's death Mr. Flaherty, writing from 
London, said: "The acquaintance which I formed 
with your son in Changsha developed rapidly into an 
intimate friendship, and by his death I have lost one 
of the best friends it has ever been my lot to make. 
I had many opportunities of observing the patient 
self-sacrifice with which he devoted himself to his 
work, in particular during the exceptionally hot sum- 
mer of 1905. The more intimately I knew him the 
more I admired his manly and upright character. 
I am convinced that his brief period of pioneer work 
in Hunan will stand out as a land-mark in the history 
of the Mission. None perhaps more than I can fully 
appreciate the difficulties and hardships which he 
had to face in that city, or realize with what indom- 
itable courage he turned delays and disappointments 
into final and lasting success. If God has called him 
away in the flower of his youth and strength it is 
because He is satisfied with the task he has accom- 
plished." 



110 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Here is found one of the secrets of Warren's sym- 
metrical nature. There was in him a happy blending 
of the vivacious with the sober, the sportive with the 
serious. Tennis was an expression of his physical 
vigor, and yet he never played when his work de- 
manded his attention. His honorable standards of 
right-doing favored quick transitions from absorb- 
ing task to glowing pastime. His clear-cut purpose 
quickened the pace of all his activities. It clothed the 
most commonplace act with the grace of high honor. 
His was a native boyishness, and withal, an unaffected 
manliness. Warren's was not " strained spirituality ; " 
it was spontaneous, exuberant spirituality. Of him 
may be said as has been claimed of another : " I never 
knew any one who gave me so strong a feeling of the 
pure joy of living." This joy often broke into radi- 
ance, brightening his face the moment he began to 
speak. It was evident that the tasks of his new life 
in a distant country, his separation from the home 
which he loved as he loved his own life, did not 
quench the ardor of his nature : " I have not yet begun 
to write my autobiography. How would *W. B. S., 
Missionary and Saint ' look on the cover of a three- 
volume edition?" 

Warren kept in touch with his classmates at the 
Seminary and occasionally wrote them a circular letter. 
This extract, written during his first year at Changsha, 
shows the depth of his feeling and his lofty ideals : — 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 111 

" This is a birthday letter. It may not be your birth- 
day, when this letter arrives, but it is mine. I am 
' twenty-one ' to-day ! Is n't that fine to have come of 
age at last and to be able to vote for the Emperor, 
the old Empress, and all the rest of our rulers ! But 
I tell you it is serious to contemplate the advance of 
time and to realize that you are approaching the 
years of discretion. When I turn thirty I shall really 
begin to think that I am old. Honestly, the very 
thought of getting slow, heavy, and lax, physically, is 
only less repugnant than the prospect of losing the 
qualities of buoyancy and hope, enthusiasm and con- 
fidence which one naturally associates with the days 
of youth. But if there are good things in our lives 
now, we need not fear their loss, for we must believe 
that they give place to what is better. There never 
can be gain without some loss. We must believe we 
gain and we must gain, or accept the loss. Still the 
spirit of youth need not be sacrificed. The capacity 
of feeling deeply and freshly, of enjoying experiences 
keenly, of having faith in men and joy in life, of 
keeping the heart child-like, however old and wise 
the head becomes ; this is worth holding and for this 
I yearn. 

"Let us all live the abundant life, fellows. That 
expression means a great deal and it will take my 
whole life to prepare me to understand what it can 
mean. To fill our lives with outgoings and incomings, 



112 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

with many interests, many sources of enjoyment, 
many means of self-expression, to live broadly among 
men, deeply within and always in connection with the 
Illimitable. In quiet parishes and mission stations, 
it is hard to keep the windows open to the distant 
view. Too much right at hand claims our attention 
and we forget to lift up our eyes unto the hills. 
These thoughts are very deeply wrought into me as 
they doubtless are in you all, in different form. Let 
us live them out and make them more practical, by 
experiencing their strength in action and character. 

"May God bless you all and lead you into new- 
ness of life, as the days of your service increase in 
number." 

Writing to one of his intimate friends he seems 
almost to divine the future: "I do not know what 
is before me, but I am * building my nest in the 
greatness of God.'" 

During the month of May Warren made his first 
visit to Kuling. It was not for rest but for conference 
with his associates, Gage and Hume : — 

" Here I am at Kuling at last. They say that one 
of the safest and wisest remarks for a bachelor to 
make when he is shown a baby of uncertain age and 
is expected to say something, is, 'Well, that is a 
baby ! ' So I say of Kuling, ' This is a place ! ' yet a 
little disappointing to those who have visited Switz- 
erland or the White Mountains! But let me bring 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 113 

you to Kuling more gradually. Changsha was left 
behind at daybreak. The next day we came into 
Hankow, ' the Chicago of China,' a place whose trade, 
activity, and westernism seem increased every time I 
see it. I had time for breakfast on board and a walk 
the entire length of the Bund to the Gilberts', before 
the proper hour for putting in an appearance on 
Sunday morning should arrive. We went to church 
and saw a few friends. We, my boy and I, left Han- 
kow Sunday evening and pulled up at Kiu-kiang just 
after breakfast the next morning. My boy was put in 
a chair and carried by three men ; two others started 
off with our things, but I, feeling young and husky, 
determined to hoof it. So off we started in a bunch, 
the yellow horse leading and I at his shoulder a good 
second. The first part of the journey led through 
the city of Kiu-kiang and soon brought us out into 
the plain. We could see the high mountains of Kuling 
in the distance, but the plain looked very long and so 
it was found to be. May is not a cool month in China 
and yesterday was rather a trying day. There being 
no sun it seemed a good time to start, but we soon 
found how oppressive the atmosphere was. The 
clouds shifted about in the sky, occasionally letting a 
little sun through, yet there seemed to be no air mov- 
ing. It took us most of the morning to get across the 
plain and then we seemed to go along the base of this 
line of hills without going up very much. It was very 



114 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

hot and I think I never felt any walk so much. About 
noon we reached what is known as the 'half-way- 
house,' but I was glad to learn that two thirds of the 
distance had been covered. When I got to the top of 
this steep mountain, or range of mountains, I was 
fairly 'all in.' These hills are in stern contrast with 
the plain, rising abrupt and smooth to their irregular 
summits, but they are so shorn of any tree of respect- 
able size, they do not seem natural. Kuling was 
reached at about three and I must have spent an hour 
in trying to find our place, but patience was rewarded 
and it will never take so long again. 

"You enter Kuling proper at one end of an ele- 
vated valley, with steep hills on either side, whose 
slopes are covered with a low shrubby growth. Here 
are the summer homes of many missionaries, staring 
little structures of white stone with still whiter seams 
of mortar, standing bold and unrelieved on every bit 
of space large enough for a house to get a grip. With 
their corrugated iron roofs just big enough to cover 
them they look more like little guard houses, so broad 
and solid and sturdy are they. There is little variety 
in architecture. They seem to have no mutual under- 
standing as to which point of the compass a building 
should face, each being quite regardless of his neigh- 
bors and careful only to get the most out of his lot. 
One might imagine that all the houses had been let 
fall from some height above us and that each had 



THE YEAR OF BEGINNINGS 115 

remained where it landed. In many cases the side of 
the hill has been dug away in order to construct a 
flat surface for building, thus leaving a steep gravelly 
bank rising from behind the servants' quarters. Our 
Mission house here is better than the average, better 
built and better furnished. It consists of five rooms 
in a row, four furnished with bath-rooms and the 
centre one partially for use as a sitting-room and 
dining-room. " 

At the conference held in the Mission bungalow at 
Kuling, the curriculum of study was arranged and 
many of its details agreed upon ; it was also decided 
to open a dispensary at Changsha as soon as prac- 
ticable. In this most important preliminary work, 
before the school itself had been established, Gage's 
scholarly tastes and Hume's training in science, plus 
the sagacity and level - headedness of each, and 
Warren's practical good sense, effectively blended. 
From this successful conference Gage, with Mrs. 
Gage, came to America for the summer, Hume re- 
mained at Kuling, while Warren returned to Chang- 
sha, after an absence of ten days. 



VIII 

THE FOUNDING OF THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 

As time passed it became evident that it was im- 
practicable, at least for the present, to pursue further 
the attempt to secure land for college buildings. In 
view of the obstacles the committee cabled from New 
Haven to hold the question of purchasing land in 
abeyance. Attention was now turned to the search 
for temporary quarters in the city itself. The first 
thought was to rent rather than buy : " We want to 
hire a large house, where there will be room enough 
for us all and for the school, also. But I am almost 
in despair of securing this as the city is full of schools, 
many of them without suitable accommodations, and 
looking for better ones. There are many Chinese, 
men of property, glad to buy any house for sale and 
there is strong dislike of renting to foreigners. Real 
estate is at a premium here and we find conditions 
that do not hold anywhere else in the Province. If 
we could rent a large house in the city to-morrow, 
we could begin at once to make the improvements 
necessary for our comfort." 

Early in August, 1906, Dr. Hume came down from 
Ruling and long conferences were held between 
Warren and himself over the steps to be taken 



THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 117 

toward the proper development of the school. As a 
result a house was rented for use as a dispensary to 
become the centre of that most important depart- 
ment — medical work. " We are very happy about 
it," says Warren, " for although it is not a great event 
in a long course of mission history, we have made a 
beginning and are able now to open work of our own 
in the fall. It is the first bit of permanent work ac- 
complished by us and we have done it without the 
help of other missionaries. There are changes to be 
made in the building ; we felt this was the thing to do 
and we did it." 

After the ball had once been started it rolled rap- 
idly, and the long-expected crisis came suddenly into 
view. Patience in waiting the favorable turn of 
affairs, and the two summers spent in the heat of the 
city, were at last rewarded, the second stage of pro- 
gress following closely upon the first. On the 19th 
of August Warren gave, with confident detail, the 
steps which led to the purchase of a house: "This 
letter will bear no uncertain note to you to-day. It is 
raining hysterically, as if the weather had felt the 
strain of the week and, now that the crisis has passed, 
had lost its self-control. Last night our faithful agent, 
who has worked bravely and skillfully through it all, 
brought us a collection of deeds showing that we are 
the lawful owners of a piece of land, with a house on 
it, here in the heart of the city. It is located on one 



118 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

of the principal thoroughfares known as 'Official 
Street.'" 

When the transaction is completed and the first 
payment made, fourteen papers are passed and pro- 
nounced by an old resident in China to be the clean- 
est and most complete he ever saw. And now the 
process of transformation begins, making the build- 
ing habitable for the school. Warren describes the 
work : " The program of the week has been on this 
wise; after breakfast, as soon as I can leave the 
house in good shape, I hasten down to the school, 
which is fifteen minutes' walk from here. There I 
find a busy scene. There are carpenters, masons, 
painters and glass-fitters hard at work. The car- 
penters are laboring over doors that must be made 
or repaired, knocking desks and benches into shape, 
putting down a floor for my servants, making a few 
platforms for the teachers in the various (4) recita- 
tion-rooms, window-frames, beds, a big flat seat-of- 
honor for the guest-hall and such articles for use and 
ornament. The masons are plastering the brick walls 
that rear their dull height all over the premises and 
then treating them to coats of whitewash. The stone- 
masons are tossing huge slabs of stone about, making 
steps from one level to another, or paving the little 
courts through which one must pass from one building 
to another. The oilers are at work everywhere follow- 
ing the steps of the carpenters like blood-hounds and 




By courtesy of Yale Alumni Weekly 

FRONT GATE OF YALE MISSION COLLEGE 



" Great Ya-li College " (Translation of inscription) 



THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 119 

daubing on the clean white wood a mixture of various 
things including pigs' blood. The glass men putter 
around and try to help the good work along, succeed- 
ing only in adding to the general confusion. It is 
quite necessary that I be there. Not only must I tell 
them in the first place what is to be done, but I must 
see that it is done and that it is done not according to 
their ideas but according to mine. Then there are 
changes in my plans as the days go on and there are 
constantly new things to be done which were not 
noticed before. So I spend the day in going from one 
end of the long premises to the other, watching, or- 
dering, urging and consoling the several score of men 
who are there in one capacity or another. The 
teachers' rooms must be first in order with their beds, 
desks, tables, stools and the like all furnished. The 
dormitories, the school-rooms, the kitchen and the 
dining-room must be in shape, and if I do not see 
that all is right you may be sure that all will not be 
right. From the drains under the earth to the tiles in 
the roof above the earth, the one in charge must be 
on hand to see that what should be, is. It is axiomatic 
in China that to have things right one must person- 
ally superintend the work done, and I am proving 
that there are no exceptions here. When noon comes 
and the men go across to the dispensary property for 
their dinner, I sit down with the faithful Niu, he of 
the big head and short body, my former teacher and 



120 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

constant stand-by since first coming to the city. 
From a neighboring restaurant rice in a large wooden 
tub and several bowls of vegetables, meat, stew, or 
fish are brought and we get to work with chop-sticks 
in true Oriental fashion. Then there is a little native 
tea to wash it down and we begin work again." 

Dr. Hume, writing of this period, says: "During 
the summer of 1906 we worked together over the 
problem of property in Changsha, finally securing 
the school and hospital premises. And day by day, 
as we climbed the steps at the evening hour, and sat 
together on the little roof-seat above Warren's room, 
his word was always an expression of wonder at 
God's manifest guidance through that day. And 
always with it the most sane and natural valuation 
of our own part. Those were precious days." 

An epoch in the history of education in Central 
China was the opening of the New Yale. Of all the 
schools in Changsha none were designed to do the 
work the Yale Mission was sent to China to accom- 
plish, namely, University education. The process 
must be one of gradual evolution ; to make a begin- 
ning was highly essential. Now that a footing had 
been gained and the purchase and re-modelling of a 
building with school-rooms, reception-room, chapel, 
etc., completed, pupils could be gathered and teaching 
could commence. William J. Hail had joined the 
missionary force and all was ready for launching the 



THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 121 

new movement : " On Friday morning, Nov. 16th, 
at eight o'clock the students (some twenty of them) 
gathered in the chapel for the opening exercises. We 
had sent notice to all the missionaries in the city to say 
that we were opening very quietly and that a formal 
occasion would be observed at a later date. So there 
were only three or four foreigners besides our own 
people at eight o'clock on Friday morning. Hume, 
Hail and I, in academic gowns and the three Chi- 
nese in ceremonial robes, hats with brass or glass 
buttons, filed in and ascended the platform. The 
students were on their feet and upon facing them 
they and we bowed deeply in Chinese fashion. Then 
I led the service following the Episcopal morning 
prayer form (in Chinese); a hymn, practised for the 
first time the night before, was sung and the service 
proper was opened. Then we each made a few 
remarks in Chinese, Hail's being translated into col- 
loquial by Mr. Kao, our teacher from Doctor Mat- 
teer's school in the North. This concluded the ser- 
vice and the remaining half hour of the first period 
was employed in the studies appointed for that time. 
v We are indeed where it is deep. Here we are in charge 
of a school in old China, where schools have been an 
institution as long as the country has had an articulate 
existence, and here we are with our inexperience 
trying to institute a curriculum that shall be sufficient 
to meet the needs of these eager young men. Many 



122 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

problems as to discipline come to our attention at 
once and we are constantly searching our hearts to 
find the solution for the present day, and the prece- 
dent for days to come. We find that Chinese schools 
publish very excellent catalogues, but they do not 
pretend to keep up to the standard set. This may be 
one reason why so many have been willing to enter a 
school where there is advertised a strict discipline 
and high ideals — the feeling that we will not live up 
to what we preach. Now we are on trial and in the 
various things that constitute the policy and disci- 
pline of the school we must be confident and efficient." 
Early in the autumn Warren arranged a set of rules 
and regulations for the school, decided about tuition 
fees, courses, and many like details. It was put into 
Chinese by three of the teachers. Then he reduced to 
system outlines of preparatory, academic, and gradu- 
ate work : " This has not been easy, for it is new work 
for me, especially difficult when you are considering 
the needs of a foreign people. I have used all the wit 
I have and have consulted the other outlines of 
schools in China at hand, but after all it is something 
of a responsibility to publish the policy of the school 
and to set forth its courses for the first year alone. 
Still the Committee has put me here and they will not 
blame me if I do the best I can. This week I have 
added to our staff one new man, a genuine Chinese 
scholar of the old style, one who has a good reputation 



THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 123 

here in the city and one who will help us by his con- 
nection with our institution. First I went with my 
stand-by, Niu, to call on him. He was out, but the 
next morning at nine o'clock he came to see me, 
dressed in the robes, boots and hat to which his offi- 
cial rank entitled him. It was a short call and I 
bowed him out after an interchange of polite phrases. 
On the following day or so we sent him an invitation 
to teach in our school, written on flaring red paper in 
neat black characters. In response to this he came 
yesterday for the first time and helped us in arranging 
our bulletin for publication. He is over sixty and a 
genuine specimen of the Chinese scholar class. How- 
ever, he is open to enlightenment, as his willingness to 
come indicates, and he further says that he considers 
this as good as a trip to America, for he will be able to 
learn from us modern educational methods. You 
would smile if you could look in on me working with 
these three men. The old fellow is one of those who 
get very much excited when they talk. He will come 
up close to you and look at you narrowly through his 
great round glasses. Then he will break off and get 
under way. In his talk he will stoop, bend forward, 
sway backward and forward, straighten up and 
extend his arms full length and really get quite dra- 
matic. Meanwhile I look very much interested and 
very serious, although I am aching to run away and 
laugh, but I sway sympathetically from side to side as 



124 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the Chinese are apt to do when another is conversing 
with them, and grunt my entire concurrence with 
his remarks ! Sometimes we all four talk at once in 
Chinese and no one hears what any one else is saying. 
But this is not usually true, nor does it preclude our 
making rapid progress." 

A week later he writes : " The teachers are working 
in finely ; even the old Confucian scholar who, with all 
his peculiar manners, is one of the most interesting 
curios of the school. But another thing which has not 
ceased to be a wonder to me is the school building 
itself, which is so wonderfully adapted to our purpose. 
Doors have been cut, more light admitted here and 
there, two shops walled in and converted into a large 
chapel, but in the main the school has not been much 
altered. After the school was well started we turned 
our attention to getting our own little house into form 
for occupation. It is a little gem of a house and I feel 
almost selfish for occupying it. The house stands at 
the back of the property to the right, with a high wall 
between it and the school kitchen. When the gates 
are shut between us and the kitchen we are very quiet, 
although we have to pass through the school to get 
out. We have two studies in the front. Behind one of 
them is the little dining-room and behind the other is 
the back hall with the stairs. Upstairs there are four 
rooms, two for each of us. There are open fireplaces 
in the five rooms, the house is plastered throughout 



THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 125 

and, although the wood-work is not well done, it is 
going to be very comfortable, and I am taking much 
pride in the house, which has been made over accord- 
ing to my ideas and under my direction." 

Upon the question of discipline he writes : " School 
has been going for over a week and it seems as if we 
have had such an institution for a much longer time. 
I have not ceased to marvel at the ease with which the 
boys fall into the idea of a school and the smoothness 
with which it has started on its long journey. The 
boys show amenability to system and discipline. Of 
course they hope that the first speed will soon drop to 
a more lax and easy gait. This is just where we shall 
disappoint them. To be sure, we had to expel a boy 
yesterday, but it has not clogged the school machinery 
in the least. We found that he was using a different 
name from that with which he entered. It rather 
upset us to have to change the name in the record 
books and elsewhere. He declared at first that he 
came in under an assumed name so that he could 
drop out again without ' losing face' if he should find, 
as he feared he might, that the school was very strict. 
Upon close examination it appeared that another fel- 
low, a friend of his, had passed the entrance exam- 
inations but for some reason could not come, so he 
handed the privilege over to this fellow, who took his 
friend's name and changed it to his own, only when 
he thought he was safely in and there would be no 



126 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

trouble. And so the boy had to go. It will be a good 
thing from all points of view and will help us to 
maintain the good name with which the school has 
begun. " 

Dissatisfaction with one of the Chinese instructors, 
a man trained in North China, a convert to Chris- 
tianity, arose because his use of Chinese was declared 
to be imperfect. Instead of denying the boys their 
right of complaint, the teachers held conferences with 
them in order to bring them to the touchstone of rea- 
son and, with excellent good sense, finally announced 
that the Chinese teacher would be retained but an- 
other would be secured to assist him. All those who 
would abide by the decision of the faculty might sig- 
nify it by attending prayers the next morning. Nearly 
all responded, but at the close of the exercises a rebel- 
lion broke out in the hall outside, due to the insistence 
of the leader that all the boys should stand, as the in- 
structors filed into the chapel. This was interpreted 
by them to mean a studied sign of lordship over them 
and of disapproval by the teachers of their attitude 
toward the recent ruling of the faculty. Some of the 
boys left, others remained, but the reputation of the 
New Yale for discipline was established : " Our stand 
on the subject of school management is now known 
and our high standard is coming to be understood and 
appreciated. Another gain which we feel we are mak- 
ing is in winning the confidence of the boys in the 



THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 127 

school. It is not easy to make the Oriental believe in 
you; the student class, especially, is not easily con- 
vinced of your sincerity. And yet in China it is com- 
mon for the most cordial relations to exist between 
teacher and pupil. These we hope to secure for their 
own sakes as well as in the belief that these young 
friends may be led to know the joy of intimate com- 
munion with Him in Whose Name we are here." 

At the close of the academic year there were thirty 
boys in the school. Some came from very good fami- 
lies and showed their good breeding in every move- 
ment. Others were more humbly born, but there was 
a creditable evidence of earnestness on the part of the 
majority of the school, most pleasing to their in- 
structors. In the personnel of the school, the four 
great classes of Chinese Society were represented : 
Literati, Agriculturalists, Artisans, Traders. 

"What would you think of a school of thirty 
boys who, left alone every evening in the study, be- 
haved themselves with sufficient decorum to make it 
unnecessary to have any one act as proctor ! The 
Chinese boys are certainly more quiet and law-abid- 
ing than ours. On the other hand, when allowed to 
go out into the city they have to be watched very 
closely. This noon after their dinner they sent a 
delegation to us to ask that they might have Sun- 
day afternoons off. This is just what the other 
schools have and is just the thing that both stu- 



128 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

dents and teachers employ for evil purposes. We are 
being tested by these young fellows and must stand 
our ground now or it will go badly with us later." 

True to his instinct of giving the boys every plea- 
sure possible, Warren was accustomed to take them 
out for long walks, or show them how to play games : 
"Last evening [Dec. 2d] we had a house-warming 
and you may be sure it was a hot time. We had the 
whole school in and gave them an evening of real fun. 
We played * pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey,' * Jenkins-up ' 
and 'crokinole,' all of which the boys enjoyed ex- 
ceedingly. I think the element of chance in the 
second-named appealed to them especially, for there 
was a hilarious crowd around the dining-room table 
all the evening. The teachers hovered about the 
pictures of Yale and Yale men, but even ' Old Vege- 
tables ' (as we call our old classical teacher, because 
his name has the sound of the word for that useful 
variety of food) seemed interested in everything going 
on and had a good time. We had Japanese biscuit 
found at a little Japanese bakery in the city, and 
served them hot coffee." 

Warren also purposed to show the boys how to 
play American games, base-ball, tennis and foot-ball, 
realizing the purpose which he once formed when he 
wittily said to a Hartford professor : " I shall coach the 
Chinese boys in athletics, then I shall become a 
Cochin (coach in) China." 













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By courtesy of Yale Alumni Weekly 

CHINESE TEACHERS 
Dr. Niu, Dean; Mr. Ts'ai, Chinese Classics; Mr. Kao, Science 





THE YALE MISSION COLLEGE 129 

Interwoven into the events of the summer of 1906 
are evidences of an increasing tenderness on War- 
ren's part toward the home friends and his satisfac- 
tion with the work done : " Dear brother Joe : For I 
always think of you as my 'brother* preeminently. 
Are you not mine and have I not been yours in all 
things through these happy, vivid years ? And if you 
will insist upon sending me things like these that have 
just come and do come from time to time, I can do no 
less than write you and say not so much that I thank 
you, as that you have called from my soul one more 
poor expression of the unbounded admiration and 
affection that lives there for you. Your picture, your 
name, a passing flicker of memory fills my soul with 
long, rich thoughts, lengthening as far into fond hopes, 
as they come out of the hallowed past. For do we not 
live ? and is it not death to say that the best is gone ? 
What we have had together has only fitted us to live 
and be of some use. How unworthy of God to give 
honey for the moment and not strength for the 
day! 

"We have to grow older, it seems. My birthday 
hangs over me like a bad dream. I am heartily 
ashamed to be so youthful, when I am so old by the 
calendar and yet envious of the relentless years that 
take one chapter after another of one's life and put it 
beyond his touch. But I love the men and women 
who are young, all the way from four years to ninety- 



130 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

four, and I hope that that love will help to keep me as 
young and happy as I am this day. 

"This has been one of only two summers in my 
short life, when I can remember having accomplished 
anything. One summer in Vermont when I preached 
and made calls and took seven people into my little 
church ; and again this summer when I dare to think 
that I have given the Yale Mission a start in Chang- 
sha, by getting for them these two places. Such satis- 
faction is better than vacation." 



IX 

LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 

It has already been evident that Warren had recep- 
tive sympathies of a high order. He was no recluse ; 
he abhorred voluntary hermitage for the sake of self- 
gratification. The quality of his mind was essentially 
associative. He heartily welcomed any opportunity 
for showing himself a friend, a brother, an almoner of 
good. He freely gave of himself at whatever cost of 
exhaustive labors. With such a nature there was 
always before him an open door. 

Heavy rains in the spring in China fill the rivers 
rapidly, without sufficient room for outflow into the 
lakes; this is especially true of the Hsiang River, 
pouring itself into Tung-ting Lake. So much of the 
country lies low that vast areas are covered with 
water in a very short time. The flood of the spring 
of 1906 was a disastrous one, as we may learn from 
Warren's description : " We are at present passing 
through a great calamity here in Changsha. No one 
thought that we should have more than the usual 
spring flood, which sometimes works up to the west 
gates of the city, but with steady cruelty it continued 
to rise day by day. The streets outside the city 
became flooded to the upper stories, then the streets 



132 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

inside the eity began to fill, houses became uninhab- 
itable; people, loath to leave their belongings, first 
took refuge in the upper stories which most houses 
have. There they were often cut off and many have 
been drowned, refusing to be taken away from all they 
have in the world . The effect of the high water on the 
houses made of mud and thin bamboo is fatal and the 
flimsy structures are falling on all sides. Poverty will 
of course continue until business resumes its ordinary 
course ; many of the wretched people, who in the best 
of times are only a meal or two ahead of the game, will 
now be reduced to helplessness." This catastrophe 
was the signal for the expression of substantial sym- 
pathy ; an appeal was made to Hankow and Shanghai 
for financial aid ; money and food were distributed by 
the people of Changsha, both natives and foreigners. 
Into these schemes Warren entered heartily, render- 
ing personal assistance. 

Continuing the story, he says : " I have been much 
engaged of late in the affairs of the Relief Committee. 
I have been to see conditions within and without the 
city walls and I find that where the water rose build- 
ings in many cases fell down, furniture was carried 
away, other property destroyed and now sickness is 
appearing. Almost all the houses are built on the 
ground, consisting usually of one room approached 
down a dark passage-way, or by passing through 
several other rooms. Here you find wretchedness all 



LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 133 

about, a poor bed, two or three pieces of furniture, 
one or more members of the family sick from the 
dampness breathed forth from walls and floors, others 
out begging. Most of these people are never far from 
the line of hunger and a catastrophe like this sweeps 
them over into actual suffering. We went from house 
to house, distributing checks for ten, fifteen, twenty- 
five and fifty cents (gold), which were exchanged in 
the afternoon for money." 

In company with Mr. Gotteberg Warren visited the 
stricken city of Chin kiang, twenty miles north. He 
went as almoner of contributions from the people of 
Changsha, Hankow, and Shanghai. There he found 
great suffering and demand for utmost caution in the 
distribution of the money at his disposal. While there 
he writes of a summer night in a Chinese harbor: 
" The city of Chin kiang carries on a busy trade. It is 
often spoken of by the Chinese as ' Small Hankow,' 
not because of its activity but because of its situation. 
We had spent a busy day on shore distributing relief 
among the people who were slowly recovering from 
the flood and returned to our boat about sundown. It 
was too hot to eat inside, so we had the table placed on 
the top of the boat. There we pretended to partake 
of our dinner, but we had no appetite for it. There 
seemed to be no breeze and the heat of the day did not 
go with the sinking sun ; a candle burning by our side 
insisted on bending over weakly. As soon as possible 



134 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

we finished our meal and stretched ourselves out upon 
the top of the boat, among the long oars and boat 
hooks. The mouth of the small river was filling with 
boats. We were soon surrounded by them and found 
it useless to ask them to move farther on. In greater 
and greater numbers they came, until the place of 
anchorage was quite choked with them. There was a 
sullen self -constraint in the atmosphere and a change 
was feared. I knew there was no use in going below, 
so for some hours lay under the stars and tried to keep 
cool. A boat containing Chinese musicians was mov- 
ing about. One artist beats rhythmically upon a 
resonant strip of bamboo, another saws mournfully 
upon a one-stringed violin, a third contributes to the 
discord by singing shrilly in a high falsetto. They row 
from one boat to another and stop for a concert when 
bidden. Another boat travels about with refresh- 
ments, cold jelly, peanuts and — no foreigner knows 
what else. The vender calls out his wares in a mono- 
tone or hits a little bell at regular intervals. A watch- 
man moves quietly from one quarter to another and 
sounds his conch shell from unexpected localities. 
There is a quarrel between some of the boatmen. 
Every man in any way interested joins in and they all 
talk and curse at once. No one hears what any one 
else says and the trouble comes to a natural ending, 
when exhaustion sets in. Finally quietness reigns and 
I know it is after midnight. I go down and fan myself 



LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 135 

as I lie sleeplessly on my bed. Low voices, here and 
there across the still water, show that I am not the 
only wakeful one. Suddenly there is a noise, so loud, 
so startling, that I cringe at the very thought of it. A 
thunderous roar accompanied by a hoarse yell from 
many throats seems to move across our bows and only 
a few yards away. I think confusedly of pirates as I 
spring up in bed, but a word from the boatmen, who 
are on their feet in a moment, explains it all. ' Thief ! 
Did n't get him ! ' It seems that the sailors are always 
ready for this emergency and, as soon as one of them 
perceives a boat stealthily moving up, or observes a 
suspicious figure creeping along the shore, he cries 
out, fiercely. His neighbor hears the warning and, 
leaping to his feet, he cries, and so the cry travels up 
and down all the boats anchored in one locality, 
accompanied by the sound of bare feet stamping on 
the deck. Very few of the boats have small boats at- 
tached, so there is no way of pursuing the thief, who 
drops away in the darkness, but he is frightened and 
will not dare to come back, which is the principal 
thing in a Chinaman's mind. 

" There is quietness again, although I am sure that 
many eyes are on the watch. Then there is another 
noise. On every boat there is movement, for the rain 
is coming. Sails are covered, doors are closed and 
boards are slid into their grooves along the side. We 
are shut in without a breath of air, but the atmosphere 



136 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

is now cooler, although the shower is disappointingly 
short and light. Every one feels relieved and until 
daylight the fleet is asleep with a cool day coming. It 
is very often so in China ; a hot day dawns and you 
feel that many more like it would be too much, but 
there comes a welcome wind or a generous shower 
and life begins anew." 

In an earlier portion of this narrative special note 
has been made of Warren's love of home and kindred, 
which grew deeper and was more manifest as the 
months passed. Never weary of his work, always 
hopeful, he yet held himself in true loyalty to the 
home circle. His brother, Mason, made a book of 
photographs of the house at Wellesley Hills, the trees 
and the garden, which he sent to Warren, who wrote 
in reply : " I cannot think of anything which I would 
rather have you send me than just this. It is so good 
to be carried back to the dear old place when I look 
around my bed-room. It is a very nice little room to 
begin with, but these pictures which you sent me are 
pinned up on the wall now and add very much to the 
appearance of the room and much to my pleasure in 
occupying it. When you happen to take any other 
pictures which you think I would like, do be sure to 
lay them aside for me. Anything that speaks of 
home will be very welcome indeed." 

Another letter speaks for itself : " Dear Mother of 
Mine. A mail came in this afternoon with a package 



LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 137 

from you to me. Upon opening it I discovered the 
pretty Easter wishes and strong thoughts for all the 
day. I read all the bits in the ' Book of Cheer ' at din- 
ner to-night (I often read at meals) and have been 
helped already. I thank you for your choice in these, 
I thank you for the love that looked as clear as day in 
every line of the address, and every leaf within, but I 
thank you most of all for what I can never fully thank 
you, — for what you are to me. I may as well not try 
beyond the point of telling you I am out in the world 
with the precious treasure of a mother's love in my 
heart each day. In her love for me I am strong and 
my love is a reflection of hers. 

"I am very anxious that you should not think of 
me as experiencing things that would cause you pain. 
There are times when I think of you with more than 
usual tenderness, but even the good letters and gifts 
from you do not bring about unhappy collapses. You 
must think of me as well and strong, contented and 
satisfied with this work. It would not be a good thing 
if our paths were all smooth. We have been very 
much tried by our failure to get land. It may be well 
for us if our hardest trials come at the first, so long as 
we weather them and find ourselves better for the 
storms. We rebel in word as we talk of it and the 
matter is often in our silent thoughts and we find it 
hard to see why we should be blocked, when every 
consideration seems to lay upon us the greatest haste. 



138 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

It must be for the best, if one must suffer, to suffer 
with others and in their interests. May we come out 
refined by the fire and welded into a mission of men 
and women who will remain inseparable to the last." 
Towards his only sister, Katherine, he always 
manifested glowing affection, and many a breezy 
letter he wrote "My dear Little Dib," after he left 
home. In this vein he writes to her during his first 
summer in China : " What a nice little lady you are to 
write me as you do about yourself and all your friends 
in town and about the place. I would n't swap you 
for anybody's sister and all the old clothes they had in 
the house to boot. And if any of the kids get at all gay 
with you, just shake your finger at them and say that 
you will write to your big brother in China. I '11 fix 
them and I '11 come straight home and give them such 
a scolding as they never had in their lives ! Or, I can 
send my boy home and he can talk to them in Chinese 
until they are frightened almost to death. Nearly all 
the children about the streets are afraid of me. I 
don't blame them much, do you ? I am pretty fierce 
looking when I march along these stone -paved 
streets! Little boys run for all they are worth and 
get behind their mothers. Little girls can't run so fast 
because their feet are bound, but they grab hold of 
two or three younger brothers who don't know enough 
to run and chase them off into the house, or try to get 
them in the protection of fans or whatever else there 



LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 139 

may be at hand, and then they think when I have 
gotten by, * Oh ! goodness sakes alive ! what a narrow 
escape from that horrid foreign devil.' And I go 
innocently on ! But it is the worst when mothers hide 
their children's faces in their laps, for fear the wicked 
eye of the foreigner will bewitch them. And really, 
Dib, you '11 believe me when I say that I am no fiercer 
than when we took walks together on Sunday after- 
noon or sat on the front piazza and read. 

"You sometimes see a man with a very common 
pole over his shoulder, from either end of which bas- 
kets are hung for carrying things. But in one basket 
there will sometimes be a little child, with a rock in 
the other to balance him. A great many men here are 
engaged in carrying water from the river and from 
a spring outside of the city. I feel sorry for some 
of the little boys who have to go in and out with 
pails of water suspended from the carrying poles. 

" But if I tell you more my stereopticon lectures, 
when I get home, will not be very interesting. So I 
must slow up . . . and stop with a jerk ! Uff ! " 

After receiving a box from home he writes: 
" This is a holiday ! It is not kept in America, but 
here we are faithfully true to it. We call the day 
' Boxes-from-Home-Day.' I was out in the warm sun 
for a walk in the latter part of the afternoon. Re- 
turning at dusk and threading my way through the 
darkening streets, with bunches of fire-crackers going 



140 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

off around our heels (this is the New Year season 
as well as Boxes -from -Home -Day), we came in 
through our big doors to find the outer hall full of 
dusky figures and — boxes. We poked around and 
found that Mr. Fleischer, kindly remembering our 
great day, had pushed through and arrived yesterday. 
There was a cook from Hankow, a cooking stove and 
the Box, which of course is the central feature of these 
annual celebrations. Unfortunately I had a young 
fellow here teaching him Latin and English. After 
I had prepared him to enter Yale(!) I found that it 
was too late to open the box. So I went to bed, slept 
as hard and fast as I could and came down to eat my 
new cook's first breakfast, and then begin. How the 
splinters flew and how the nails groaned, as I got hold 
of them with my teeth and yanked them out ! How I 
piled into that box ! I sat in it, rolled in it, burrowed 
down in among the dictionaries and atlases, and 
splashed around among the pictures ! I tore off the 
paper coverings of bundles, foaming at the mouth 
and pawing the ground the while, until, weak and 
fainting, I had to be carried to my room by my cham- 
berlain and keeper of the hounds, where light refresh- 
ments were served until I recovered. I cannot begin 
to thank you ! I feel as if a year's waiting for such a 
box was not too long. If this sort of thing happens 
very often I shall have to have a furlough soon to 
recover. The box was fragrant; in spite of the oil 



LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 141 

paper it leaked through every crack with love and 
good wishes. I feel unworthy and shall have to 
'buck up* now and try and be good. You each de- 
serve a memorial, a long document suitably embel- 
lished and embossed ; I will see if there is any to be 
had in the neighborhood. More next Sunday, but 
until then remember that you have in China a very 
happy and grateful son and brother who is all this 
because you are so good to him." 

The variety of custom in China's complex life 
demands a broad and patient study. Unified as she 
is by ages of seclusion, by social and ancestral bonds, 
there exists within her vast boundaries great diversity, 
both physical and temperamental. In one sense, to 
know one Chinese province is to know all provinces ; 
in another sense, he who has lived in a city on the 
coast, and become familiar with its maritime features, 
finds, upon penetrating into the interior, a different 
social type, grade of intellect, standard of morality. 
It is only by visiting many portions of China that a 
person can familiarize himself with the different as- 
pects of her character, or approach a complete know- 
ledge of her resources. This fact was deeply impressed 
upon Warren's mind. First, he would see the Pro- 
vince in which he was to live and from which the 
teachers of the New Yale were to draw students. 
Then, if possible, he would see other provinces, espe- 
cially those of the far North. During the year 1906, 



142 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the only complete calendar year he spent in Chang- 
sha, he made two journeys,, one through portions of 
Hunan and one to Peking. 

About the middle of February he started with a 
party of four to explore portions of the Province lying 
southwest of Changsha. He went first by boat up the 
river Hsiang thirty miles to Siangtan, where he laid 
in a stock of provisions and secured coolies to carry 
the equipment for the tour. The caravan moved 
slowly, and there was not wanting friction over the 
restlessness and obstinacy of the servants. Travel- 
ling along one of the busiest highways in Central 
China, the party crossed the " Bridge of Ten-thou- 
sand Happinesses." The misery and squalor of some 
of the towns, especially the " beggar towns," appealed 
to their sympathies and there were occasional thrusts 
of spite against these "foreign devils" who were 
invading their borders. The pagodas, the sentries 
guarding the good luck of the people, the extremely 
narrow and stuffy streets, reminded Warren that he 
was "in real China." He visited Paoking, Yungchow, 
saw the famous coal mines worked by a party of 
Germans and rode in a veritable steam train, so vis- 
ibly does the West inoculate^ the East. After an ab- 
sence of ten days he returned to Changsha, thankful 
for all he enjoyed at his own station, and having 
discovered that Christian workers away from the 
open ports suffer many hardships. 



LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 143 

After the exacting duties of the summer of 1906 
and when the transformation of the house was well 
advanced, Warren took a few weeks for rest ; he began 
to feel the effects of the heat and saw the danger of 
pushing into the winter campaign without a respite. 
Late in September, in company with Mr. Cars well, 
father of Mrs. Hume, Warren started for Peking. 
Writing from a station on the new Hankow- Peking 
Railroad, he says : " Through the windows of a sec- 
ond-class compartment at Hankow we had our lug- 
gage thrust ; the shrill whistle blew and exactly on 
schedule time we pulled out of the depot. Had it not 
been for the crowds of natives on the platform, stand- 
ing in slant-eyed curiosity, with their hands buried 
deep in the heavy sleeves of their winter garments, 
slowly thawing out as the sun rose over the low sta- 
tion-roof, we might have thought ourselves on the 
continent of Europe. But we were off for Peking, the 
famous capital of ancient China. And now, 250 miles 
north of Hankow, I am sitting in a Chinese inn (that 
institution which brings a pang of remembrance to 
many a traveller in China), and we are at the end of 
our first day. We secured an apartment in cars of the 
English type, save thatthereis a passage-way along one 
side. Here we have had our dinner of bread, canned 
meat, helped out by some rice and other food furnished 
by the Chinese themselves. The train woke up at six 
the next morning and snorted sleepily out of the sta- 



144 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

tion. We were fast getting out of the rice country, 
characteristic of the South, into the broad plains of 
the North, brown and dusty in the September sun- 
light. Here and there clumps of trees mark the vil- 
lages where the people lived, then there were miles 
and miles of open fields ; no fences, no walls, not even 
a stone to mark boundaries, but each piece of prop- 
erty as clean as if ruled with a chalk line. On all 
sides we saw evidences of the people's thrift. Not 
only do they wrest as much from the overworked soil 
as it will yield, but their use of draught animals indi- 
cates that we are in a country where nothing goes to 
waste. Teams of donkeys, or a pony and a donkey, 
or a cow and a donkey, all possible combinations of 
all possible animals appeared on the long furrows." 

He spent some days in the great Capital, visited 
the tombs of the Ming Emperors, saw something of 
missionary work at various stations, and returned to 
his work at Changsha after three weeks' absence. 

In the early part of the following year (1907) War- 
ren made his third journey into the heart of the coun- 
try, this time up the Yuen River, in company with 
Mr. Fred Gilbert, of Hankow, an old college friend. 
He visited various cities and described in his letters 
the fine scenery that he saw. In writing of the journey 
he says: "My late tour through the Yuen River 
valley as far as Chenchow was not only very interest- 
ing, but I think it has served to give me a much bet- 



LIVING IN THE LIFE OF OTHERS 145 

ter knowledge of the work that the missionaries are 
doing ; has made it clearer to me what we can reason- 
ably expect from them in furnishing us with students 
from their lower schools and has also, I hope, by 
means of personally conversing with them, given 
them a fair and favorable idea of the work which we 
are undertaking in Changsha. Aside from any effect 
which such an excursion may have on the work of the 
Mission, it is certainly highly instructive to one who is 
anxious to learn all he can of the language and life of 
the people. I find, too, that my friends among the 
Chinese are pleased to see that I care to travel about 
in the Province and do not feel hurt that I have vis- 
ited more cities in China than most of them have seen. 
We feel very strongly our indebtedness to the mission- 
ary body of Hunan and our readiness to do all we can 
to meet our obligations to them." 



X 

KULING 

" The calendar says that to-morrow will be the 17th 
of September [1906], and my reckoning indicates that 
I shall be twenty-nine. I believe the former, but the 
latter seems to me preposterous. I cannot see the 
years go by without feeling that it is all a great mis- 
take. If my birthday came every other year it would 
still always pass with the thought that I am too young 
to be so old." It was his last birthday anniversary. 

Much was packed into the closing months of that 
eventful year. High hopes had been realized in the 
visible shaping of the Mission, the school launched, 
the machinery working smoothly. 

Warren passed from the old year into the new, all 
unconscious that there were left to him but seven 
short and busy months of that life in China to which 
he had given himself with so much zest and such 
bright anticipations. " We go to the British Consulate 
for dinner on New Year's Eve," is all he says about 
the dawning of the year 1907. The same contagious 
buoyancy, the same keen and kindly humor, the same 
interest in all about him, the same devotion to the 
welfare of the school characterized those days when 
the work was still in its initial stages. Already his life 



KULING 147 

for "the boys" appears in his plans for them, which 
covered everything which might in any way broaden 
their knowledge or develop their characters : " This 
morning I preached to the boys in Chinese and how I 
did pity them ! I think that one of the chief reasons 
for commiserating the Chinese is that they have to 
listen to foreigners preach! This is the Week of 
Prayer and there have been union meetings everyday 
at three o'clock. To-day one is to be held here in our 
chapel, our first public meeting, and we expect a full 
house. I do not preach, but yield the honor to Mr. 
Wilson of the London Mission, who is a veteran in the 
service. This evening we have a little gathering of the 
boys, they discussing some subject of interest to them- 
selves. To-night we consider whether China should 
take up arms, or be a peaceful nation." 

A little later he writes: "Our school has not yet 
closed. We have one more week of recitations and 
then examinations. Some of the students live a long 
way off and they must be starting soon in order to get 
home by New Year. Those who live very far away 
go in bands, thus making it safer and pleasanter to 
travel." 

Pictures of domestic happiness in Changsha, when 
all were gathered together and of one mind and spirit, 
appear in his letters of this time: "This morning 
[March 24th] Hume preached his maiden sermon, I 
steadying him by sitting by him and taking charge of 



148 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the opening exercises. Mrs. Hume played the organ, 
while Mrs. Thurston, Gage, Hail and Hoyt adorned 
the front row. It was a good service. They are getting 
better as we become more at home in the use of the 
language. We are having a Chinese meal once a 
week, on Sunday noon now, and it tastes very good. 
Thus the work of the servants is reduced and it is 
no trouble to bring in our portion from the school 
kitchen." 

Warren was appointed to represent the Mission at 
the Centennial Conference at Shanghai. Toward this 
event he turned with pleasure, and for it he early laid 
his plans. He writes fully of the great gathering. 
Speaking of Shanghai, he says: "Gorgeous shops 
and stores of all kinds, horses of the best, automo- 
biles, 'rickshas crowd the streets and there is no speed 
limit. The Chinese of Shanghai are learning alacrity 
with remarkable success, promptly obeying the signal 
from the man in blue." 

Speaking of the convention, he says: "Arthur 
Smith's address was strong and adequate to the occa- 
sion. I am looking for more of that kind." He was 
impressed by the Martyrs' Memorial Hall, where the 
sessions were held, and many places of interest 
attracted him. He was a guest of the British Consul, 
whose ample quarters were a delight to him. While at 
Shanghai he met many noted missionaries, many 
friends from America. After a fortnight's absence he 




SEABURY AND HOYT IN NATIVE DRESS 



KULING 149 

returned to Changsha : " Back to work again for a few 
weeks and the summer comes and we flee away." 

After the Shanghai Conference Professor and Mrs. 
Beach were cordially welcomed to the Yale counsels 
at Changsha. It was a distinct advantage to have 
the long experience and ripe judgment of Professor 
Beach upon questions affecting the initial life of the 
Mis ion. Warren made frequent allusion to this good 
fortune and counted it no ordinary event in the early 
history of educational work in the city to have on the 
ground so wise a friend and so vital a part of the Mis- 
sion work as he. May 19th Warren writes: "This 
morning Mr. Beach spoke to the boys, I presiding and 
conducting the service ; then we prevailed upon him, 
Mrs. Thurston, Dr. and Mrs. Hume and little Teddy 
to stay and share our fare with us. Last evening we 
had the entire party down here for dinner, ten in all, 
including Mr. and Mrs. Beach and Hoyt. We feel 
deserted if Hoyt is not with us on any pleasant excur- 
sion or whenever we are having a good time." 

Warren accompanied Professor and Mrs. Beach up 
to Siangtan, and had many a good talk with them on 
the future of the Mission : '* We are having some valu- 
able times with Mr. Beach. He tells us what the com- 
mittee think of us and brings with him some of their 
' Memoranda' for our examination. There is one we 
are just now considering. It covers our relation to the 
home committee and to our work here. Among other 



150 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

provisions it allows us bachelors thirty dollars for 
* vacation expenses,' and lavishes on the married 
folks seventy or seventy-five; I am therefore begin- 
ning to think that it will pay me to get married ! If I 
can get a wife who will do all the washing and cooking 
and, also, manage the housework, I can make money 
on my salary, especially if she is a vegetarian and a 
dyspeptic ! ! " 

After Warren's death Professor Beach furnished 
an estimate of him and the quality of his work as he 
saw it in May, 1907, a few weeks before he left 
Changsha for the last time. It is produced here, in 
part, with confidence that there is no one better quali- 
fied to give a just account of the work of the Mission, 
and Warren's personal share in building it up, than 
he: "For the last two years Warren's letters have 
closely revealed the dead earnestness with which he 
grappled the serious tasks confronting the Mission. 
To him the language was part and parcel of the peo- 
ple. To acquire it was, therefore, via the Chinese 
themselves, rather than through text-books on the 
language. Its study was a voyage of discovery, in the 
course of which he learned the people, as well as their 
strange tongue. His teacher was more useful than 
his text -books and a stroll in the city or country, with 
stops at temples and tea-shops, accompanied by his 
teacher or some Chinese friend, yielded a satisfactory 
return in natural, idiomatic Chinese. And yet Warren 



RULING 151 

did not neglect books and the higher forms in Chi- 
nese. His method was to read widely rather than with a 
slavish regard for the acquisition of the difficult char- 
acters and idioms. The Changsha dialect is so hard 
to understand, for a foreigner who knows only that of 
Peking, that I do not feel competent to characterize 
his linguistic attainments. I do know this, however, 
that so far as language is effective, as a medium for 
the free interchange of ideas and a bond of friendship 
between man and man, Warren had admirably suc- 
ceeded in this primary missionary task. 

"And he was even more successful in the cognate 
and more difficult undertaking of learning the people 
and winning their friendship. I have met in China 
and other mission fields hundreds of missionaries, but 
I do not recall more than half a dozen who, in so brief 
a period, have succeeded so well as Seabury in this 
most important matter of understanding men of 
wholly alien mind and character and winning their 
respect, and in many cases, their real friendship. 
Most missionaries do not accomplish in a score of 
years what he did in three. He genuinely enjoyed 
trips alone out into little-travelled sections, and had it 
not been for strong remonstrances he might have gone 
into the wild regions of little-known Kulichou instead 
of to Ruling. That Province attracted him because of 
its very rudeness and the atmosphere of adventure 
which surrounded its mountain stretches. 



152 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

"A third task which Warren surprised me in 
accomplishing, or nearly so, was in the search for 
land for the Mission. In 1904 Mr. Luce and I had 
spent many days in exhausting the possibilities as to 
sites within some miles of Changsha. Owing to Mr. 
Gage's bodily weaknesses at that time, and Dr. 
Hume's later arrival, most of the burdensome search 
for land and practically all the negotiations for the 
property actually secured, fell upon Seabury. He had 
developed to a marked degree, for one so new to the 
country, many of those characteristics which enable 
one to maintain his ground in land dickering. Reti- 
cence, humor, ability to chaff, firmness, and a real 
friendship, together with entire faith in God, won the 
day in the case of the city property purchase. The 
search for land outside the city was continued to the 
end. So unselfishly did Seabury give himself to this 
work that he spent two summers in the fearful heat 
of Changsha, so unsanitary in July and August. He 
would have spent his last summer there, instead of 
going to Kuling, had it not been for the Mission's 
insistence on his getting relief from strain, in that cool 
mountain valley. 

" A fourth respect in which Warren exhibited grow- 
ing strength was in the capacity for leadership. So 
readily did he respond to the demands upon him that 
I once prophesied that if he were spared long enough, 
he would in twenty years prove himself one of the 



KULING 153 

foremost leaders in China's missionary force. He 
was wise enough never to assert himself as against 
his associates, yet his wisdom was usually so self- 
commendatory that it gained assent. His joyous life 
and humorous way of lighting up a difficult question 
or situation always made him a welcome associate in 
other missions as well. Having first found his way 
to the affections of others it was easy to be their leader. 
Such a man would have commended himself still more 
to the Chinese had he been longer in the relation of 
leader among them. What Seabury would have been 
as an educational leader, it is hard to say. He loved 
the students and yet could be firm as a rock with them, 
and they honored him in the very process. 

"Plans of his which we talked over very fully 
during a trip to Siangtan suggest two of the 'might 
have beens,' had his life been prolonged a few years. 
One of them was a projected course of philosophical 
study which was to be made his avocation in China 
and might be continued at Yale during his first fur- 
lough with a possible Ph.D. as its seal, but not as its 
motive. The works of the Sung Dynasty Philosophers 
had greatly appealed to him from a superficial know- 
ledge of them and he felt that the study of years might 
enable him not only to understand China better, but 
it might also be a genuine contribution to the student 
of philosophy in Occidental lands, if the result of his 
studies should in time be given to the world. 



lo4 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

"While Seabury's enthusiasm for the Sung Phi- 
losophy, despite its being clothed in so forbidding and 
impenetrable a garb as the classical Chinese, sug- 
gests a profound and scholarly man, his second propo- 
sition, which fairly transfigured him in the telling, 
reveals his genuinely Christian character in its 
breadth of human interest. He had a vision of the 
time when land outside the city would be secured, so 
that the city property would be needed no longer for 
college purposes. Instead of the present lowly build- 
ings, devoted to education, a worthy pile, the finest 
in Changsha, was to be erected for the purposes of a 
Young Men's Christian Association and Social Set- 
tlement combined. Its object was to be twofold ; one 
the social and Christian betterment of the young man- 
hood of his adopted city, the other a prophylactic 
against mere selfish scholasticism in the faculty and 
students of the Chinese Yale. To this building they 
should come, from their scholarly isolation beyond 
the city walls, and freely mingle with men of another 
type, who greatly needed just such Christian help- 
fulness as this centre would enable them to give. How 
could a man who glowed with so high and holy an 
enthusiasm have been anything other than a most 
potent influence for good, had God permitted him 
to spend his life as an educator? 

"To recapitulate, Warren Seabury was a man 
whose three years in China were at once a record of 




W P 



RULING 155 

unusual accomplishments and of still greater proph- 
ecies. He was symmetrically fashioned; he loved 
and touched life at very many points. Like the Man 
of Galilee, he mingled with the lowliest and charmed 
the highest with his humility, humanity and self- 
sacrificing goodness. Though the years of his active 
ministry were as few as His Master's, Warren Sea- 
bury has sown seed that will reproduce itself in many 
lives through the future years. Our Mission, and 
those who knew him in China, both Chinese and for- 
eigners, are the richer because of his generous, buoy- 
ant, sacrificial life and his prophetic trust in God, 
Who outlives all His works and Who looks upon such 
a career as Warren's as Jesus did upon the poured- 
out cruse of precious ointment." 

And now begins the summer hegira to Ruling. The 
weather had settled into its customary grooves of 
unrelieved heat and the little children of the Mission 
must be taken to the resort among the hills. Writing 
on June 2d, he says: "We are widowers and bach- 
elors indeed, to-day. Last night our fair ones left us 
for Ruling. We had them all down to dinner and had 
the usual jolly time. There were eight of us in all 
and the pleasure of being in our newly furnished 
dining-room was not the least of the evening's plea- 
sures. We have had it wainscoted lately and stained a 
weathered oak color. Above the plate-rail the white 
wall has been colored dark green ; the entire effect 



156 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

is very good. Hail's prize cups and mine, Chinese 
plates and brasses, ornament the plate-rail and it all 
looks very well, I can assure you. The worst of it is 
that we who have put the money into it must get out 
next fall and leave it for some one else. We have made 
plans for the bachelors to live over the school and these 
alterations will soon be begun." 

As the end of the year's work draws near, the last 
fortnight he was to spend in the city he had learned to 
love, and with "the boys" into whose lives he had 
entered with fond hopes of a future college of far- 
reaching influence, his words carry a forceful mean- 
ing to those at home, to whom he writes: "This 
morning Hail and I got up at five and went out for a 
walk. There is a range of low hills across the river 
and considerably below the city, which has loomed up 
like a promised land for almost as long as we have 
been here. Often we cast our longing eyes over in 
that direction and talk of the time when we can look 
from our verandas out over the river and see the boats 
coming in or can rest our eyes upon the smooth sides 
of the hills in the other direction. We often think how 
much better it will be for every one of our number, 
from the little children to the men who do the work 
and the boys for whose sakes we are here. 

" So this morning before it became warm, we went 
across (one can go the entire distance to the further 
bank now in one boat, the water having covered the 



KULING 157 

island in places) to the further side and started up 
over the low hills. There is a strip of rice land along 
the bank of the river, protected by a bank, on which 
the men who tow the boats travel, and used also as a 
highway for people passing up and down the river on 
foot. These rice fields make inland, here and there, 
thus breaking the regular front presented by the low 
red hills, which begin to rise from the level of the 
rice fields at a distance of fifty or a hundred yards 
from the river. Perhaps it would be better to call the 
higher land bluffs, for they hardly rise to the dignity 
of hills, although they are prominent from their loca- 
tion and also from the red color which here and there 
lies bare through their covering of green. There are 
on these bluffs some very attractive pieces of land 
for our purpose, and this morning (as is always the 
case when we pass through or near that region) our 
imaginations were given free rein as we attempted 
to picture what we could do with such an opportu- 
nity. We would turn the low land where the rice is 
now growing into athletic fields, and would not be 
worried if the river did overflow that part of our pro- 
perty once in two or three years. Then we would even 
off the irregularities in the slope above and have steps 
ascending to the higher level. There would be our 
houses along the front stretch and commanding the 
river, while the dormitories and recitation halls would 
be further in, commanding a view across the hills to 



158 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

the west. It would be a beautiful place and I feel as 
if God must mean it for us. When I think of the 
advantages in such a place I become almost unre- 
conciled to our present quarters and I certainly feel 
impatient to start on permanent ground." 

Warren was about to leave the city with which he 
had been associated only two years and four months. 
He had viewed her walls on all sides, had become 
familiar with her narrow streets, her busy people. 
He pictured the Changsha of the future, when the 
civilization of the Far West would have become dom- 
inant there. He knew her environs, having gone over 
them with every possible attention to detail, in local- 
ities he regarded as coming within the requirements 
of the "Promised Land." And now he was unwit- 
tingly doing the last things, making his plans to go 
off to the hills. He had remained there during two 
hot summers: "Other missionaries do this; why 
not I ? " His home friends, his associates at Chang- 
sha, had argued against it, but he did not yield. 
When, during a particularly hot spell in the previous 
summer, he almost relented and was about to go to 
Kuling and, as he humorously said, "enjoy the plea- 
sures of sin for a season," he so deeply felt the claims 
of the work that he remained behind, and now, even 
as late as June 16th, he still tried to make out a case, 
saying: "Why not remain another summer, also? 
It is hot, but not too hot. White suits, a fresh one 



RULING 159 

every two days at least, shirts, collars and all the rest, 
fill up the basket and fatten the wash bill. So we 
drink refreshing lemonade and lime-water, sit under 
the punkah, sleep as late as we can in the morning 
and, when school closes, I am going to be a lazy man 
of leisure, a disgrace to my family. If one does this 
he will get on m anxiously." 

He spent a few days with the Commissioner of 
Customs on the island, in the same commodious 
house where he found relief from the heat during the 
previous summer. He writes, June 30th: "Here in 
the school all is quiet. Most of the boys have left 
and those who wish to remain all summer are pre- 
paring to move over to the Dispensary while the 
work here is in progress. To-morrow alterations be- 
gin and will go on for several weeks. We hold ex- 
aminations for such students as wish to enter the 
school in the fall." 

Under date of July 7th he says : " The work on the 
house, which is one of the things keeping me, is now 
in its initial stages and there is very little that I can 
do for several weeks. The examinations are now out 
of the way and the teachers and servants are paid off 
for another month. The question of land is always 
in my mind and I am to hear to-day whether there is 
any reason for my staying on on that account. I feel 
quite enthusiastic at the prospect of seeing Kuling in 
the summer season and having a good solid rest with 



160 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

my friends. Mrs. Lovell writes that I must go and 
stay with them. She adds : ' We will have all the music 
we want, that we will rise late, sleep long and eat the 
bread of pleasure.' It sounds very attractive and I 
shall enjoy long hours of conference with those good 
people. " 

On the morning of July 10th, he left Changsha for 
Kuling. He had reached a juncture in his work when 
he could breathe freely, confident that no harm could 
come to the cause while he was away. On that day he 
was at his best, more mature in thought, more experi- 
enced in practical affairs, richer in knowledge of the 
Chinese character and language. It was impossible to 
know him at that time without a consciousness of 
something rare in his nature, something broad and 
deep to which he had come by the gradual ascent of 
his aspiring soul. He was in his youthful prime, just 
ready for the educational work to which he had given 
his ardent life. In the ripening of his early manhood 
there was apparent a proportion between his physical 
and mental powers, while the deeply spiritual, ever 
kept in reserve, was gaining new strength and sweet- 
ness. His feelings had grown more delicate, more 
responsive to the appeal of reasonable pity. We pic- 
ture him on the deck of the steamer, still searching the 
shore with a vision ever eager to find a site for the New 
Yale. Alas! he was never to behold her in all the 
beauty he had pictured her. His work for his beloved 



RULING 161 

College had been done, and speedily done. It re- 
mained for others to take it up and carry it forward. 
Writing from Ruling, July 21, 1907: — 
" There ! I suppose that the assurance of my be- 
ing in Ruling will do something towards making 
your summer more comfortable. If it will there is 
one good reason supplied for my coming here. 
* Lassie ' (my little dog) and I were escorted by the 
Gilberts to the steamer. There was a long delay in 
her casting off and we found it very hot against 
the hulk. At Riu-kiang we, who were bound for 
Ruling, came ashore and repaired to the rest house. 
There coolies were called and the trip up to Ruling 
began. It was not a very hot day below and as 
we wound along the steep, bare hills in the bright 
sun, it became cooler and cooler. My hands were 
badly burned, but no other ill-effect of the journey 
was experienced. The Lo veils' little house was soon 
found and I was heartily welcomed. A wind had 
begun to blow and by sunset it seemed like an Octo- 
ber evening in the mountains of New Hampshire. 
Thus far there has been no rain. During the day it 
has been even possible to play tennis at noon, a 
thing that no one would attempt on the plain. In 
the evening it has been so cool that we have wanted 
a wrap when sitting on the veranda. Compare this 
with the hot nights and blistering days below and 
one is convinced of the first great attraction of 



162 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Kuling. The people have been very nice and I have 
been picnicking, or dining, or going to some other 
social function every day since I came." 

Warren spent thirteen days at Kuling. All who 
have written of those days speak of his buoyancy, his 
irrepressible mirth, his great vivacity, as of one who 
has just been released from school. There were con- 
ferences with his co-laborers, Hume and Gage, and 
many were the good times he had with his host and 
hostess, Mr. and Mrs. Lovell, and with the children 
whom he knew. 

Sunday evening, July 28th, was spent around the 
piano in the Lovell bungalow. They sang the beauti- 
ful hymns in "In Excelsis." At half-past nine War- 
ren excused himself that he might write his weekly 
home letter. When he had finished it he placed it on 
the mantel to be posted the following morning, after 
he had left for the excursion which had been pre- 
viously arranged. The letter is almost wholly given 
to the subject of the purchase of a house : — 

Kuling, Lot No. 76 B., 
July 28, 1907. 

"Kuling has captured me and I am its obedient 
servant. Such beautiful air! for we are up 4500 feet 
above the level of the sea. Almost no mosquitoes and 
I have used no netting over my bed since I came. Not 
a single punkah in the place! The valley is not 



RULING 163 

pretty, as I wrote last year and as you can see from 
photographs of it; the houses are little blocks of 
stone standing up in the searching sunlight. Some 
are perched high on the sides of the hills or balance 
themselves even on the very tops of the long slopes. 
There are two major classes here, (1) those who 
like lofty dwellings and minimize the labor and dis- 
tress of climbing to get the view, and (2) those who 
prefer a more central location, lower down, from 
which one can go up if he wishes. I am a late convert 
to the latter class, for I like a place near people, near 
the courts and the church. As to sunsets, they never 
come oftener than once a day(!) and you can always 
clamber up a hill if you wish to see one. Then there 
are days when it is wet and no one sees anything. So 
on the whole I belong to the lowland people. Yes, 
Ruling is good. I have been playing tennis again. 
A man named Richards, Yale Sheff, is with me in 
doubles. We have beaten all combinations thus far 
in practice. And the people are so cordial and the 
children are so happy and well ! Picnics for young 
men and maidens, suppers for the unwary married 
ones, moonlight excursions for the sentimental and 
those who were once so — all these things attract. A 
concert, a convention and other public functions, 
keep the community well toned up. It is a good 
place and I am wondering how to get the most out of 
it in coming years. 



164 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

" All this is the introduction, used with a homiletic 
purpose — 'to gain the hearer's attention,' 'win 
their sympathy,' 'enlist their moral support,' etc. 
For I am about to make a serious proposal. 

" Proposal. I propose to buy a house ! There now !" 

Then Warren goes on to describe a house which 
was at that time for sale ; it was " back from the road, 
sequestered, opening out to a fine view down the val- 
ley." He concludes this, his last letter, by saying: — 

"In getting a house of course I am thinking that I 
can then have a place for you when you come out to 
see me. This is bound to be. Then, if I do not rent 
it, I can have friends with me, ask some married 
people to run the house and take me in, or I can have 
a pleasant company of my own choosing. I am as 
enthusiastic as a boy over the prospect of a new pos- 
session. We shall see ! I hope that it can be. 

" W T ith much love to all and with many apologies 
for being your son and brother ! 

Warren." 

So ends his last letter ; so terminates that long list 
of bright and cheery messages to his home friends. 
It carries the same candor, the same deference to 
parental wishes, the same look forward, so like him 
in all his correspondence. 



XI 

THE ACCIDENT 

The morning after Warren wrote his last home 
letter he was up at five o'clock and soon off on the 
long tramp to the " White Deer College." It was on 
this trip that the fatal accident occurred. The inci- 
dents connected with that sad event are affectingly 
told by Warren's friend and co - worker, Brownell 
Gage, and are as follows: — 

" Five of us left Kuling last Monday morning, July 
29th, to make a visit to the 'White Deer College,' 
which lies at the foot of the mountains about ten 
miles from here. This college dates back to the ninth 
century, and is of special interest because of the con- 
nection which it has with the names of some of 
China's great literati, especially the writer of the 
standard commentaries on the classics, the sage Chu 
Hsi, who did much for the college in the twelfth 
century. It was therefore of special interest to our 
party, all of whom were engaged in educational 
work, — Mann at St. John's College, Shanghai ; 
Kemp at Boone College, Wuchang ; Seabury, Hume 
and Gage at the school of the Yale Mission in 
Changsha. 

"We started with a beautiful sunrise, but about six 



166 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

o'clock we found ourselves in the Nankang pass sur- 
rounded by clouds and mist, and at one time were on 
the point of turning back. But the clouds rose above 
us and the bright sunlight appeared on the horizon 
over Poyang Lake. So we went down the mountain. 
The road is in beautiful scenery all the way, and in 
spite of frequent drenchings from the rain, and hav- 
ing to ford streams up to our knees, we all enjoyed 
the walk immensely. We talked of books, and Mann 
was most interesting and suggestive with results of 
his discriminating reading. Seabury spoke of how 
much he was enjoying a book of Newman's which 
he was reading. That led our conversation to theo- 
logy and we shall not forget the profitable talk we had 
on the subject and on related topics of Christian his- 
tory and experience. We were enough unlike in our 
points of view and habits of thought and theological 
training to make it worth while to get each other's 
opinions. Altogether it was a day one likes to look 
back to and few days in our lives have had in them so 
little to regret, up to the time of the accident, when 
Seabury fell into the stream. Both men, if they could 
have spoken, would have said it was a good day to 
be their last on earth. 

"The spirits of the party rose with the increasing 
wetness, and after a lunch under the hospitality of a 
Chinese roof, we reached the College in a mood to 
appreciate the visit. It is in an ideal location for se- 



THE ACCIDENT 167 

eluded literary study, surrounded by hills and trees, 
with a fine view of the * Five Old Peaks ' in the back- 
ground. We wandered from court to court trying to 
puzzle out inscriptions, and hunting for some of the 
famous tablets. Mann showed that he had made 
good use of his time in the study of Chinese. The 
Literary Assembly Hall, adorned only with the char- 
acters of the eight virtues; Memorial Hall, with its 
images of Confucius, Mencius, and their disciples; 
the shrine of Chu Hsi, and back of it, the cave of the 
poet, Li P'u, 'the White Deer Gentleman/ with its 
stone image of the white deer, placed here in the 
fourteenth century by Ho Cheng — these were all 
visited and Dr. Hume took several photographs. 

" We left the College about half -past twelve. As we 
started back, I turned and said to Warren : * Won't it 
be good to get back to the swimming pool and have 
a plunge ? ' He answered that he did n't know whether 
he would go in or not. He had previously told Hume 
that he could swim forty or fifty yards. I knew of a 
perfectly safe pool with a gravel bottom, in a small 
canyon of the mountain stream which our path fol- 
lowed. When we got to the place, about half -past 
one o'clock, I turned aside from the path to look for 
the way to this pool. Warren, Kemp, and I were to- 
gether, Hume and Mann being two hundred yards 
behind us. 

" The stream at this point has worn a canyon whose 



168 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

sides are almost vertical walls of rock, though further 
down the stream they are steep banks covered with 
dense undergrowth. In the brook bed below are 
several pools, varying in depth, some of which make 
excellent swimming places. At the head of the canyon 
and twenty or more feet above it, on a level with the 
road, is a smooth flat rock, crossed by the main road 
on its upper side, from which it slopes gradually to 
the bed of the brook, which thus flows across the 
rock on the side furthest from the road. The rock 
conducts the stream to a plunge of twenty feet into 
the pool at the head of the canyon. This is a deep 
pot-hole, shaped like a tea-kettle, whose rock walls 
are polished smooth by the whirling eddies. In dry 
weather, when the brook is small, many of us have 
swum up into it from the shallower pools below. 
But on Monday, with the stream and the cascade 
swollen by the rain, it was almost impossible of ap- 
proach, because the current at its mouth was so swift. 
"While I was hunting for a path in the bushes fifty 
yards below the waterfall, Warren must have started 
to undress on the flat rock referred to above, — per- 
haps not intending to go in swimming but only to 
bathe in the stream above the falls. The rock he was 
on was slippery because it was wet by the rain. Hume 
was just in time to see him slip, and slide, his momen- 
tum increasing with his efforts to gain his balance. 
In a moment more he was carried by the stream over 



THE ACCIDENT 169 

the falls, going over in a sitting posture. He came up, 
struck out two or three strokes, and then went under, 
not to be seen again. Mann was not in time to see 
him, and Hume had no chance to reach the pool and 
he could not swim. Mann went down immediately 
over the face of the rock into the pool just below the 
pot-hole into which Warren had fallen. It was a 
dangerous descent, and I do not know how he could 
have accomplished it. He told me that he fell the last 
eight or ten feet. The roar of the water prevented 
Kemp and me from hearing. Having failed to find a 
path, I came back to the top of the bank and was told 
by Hume what had happened, ten minutes after the 
event. I rushed back where the path should have been 
and got into the water at the pool we had intended to 
swim in,fifty yards below the waterfall, and then swam 
up to where Mann was working, just below the upper 
pool. He told me he had tried five or six times to get 
into this upper pool, only to be washed down by the 
water at its mouth. While I was getting my breath 
and taking off my clothes he made one or two more 
attempts. Then we went together for the last effort, 
swimming up with the back current to the rock at the 
mouth of the pot-hole. This time Mann, somehow, 
got a shove on the rock which carried him across the 
current of the upper pool and was carried around 
almost under the waterfall. I tried to follow, but was 
washed down by the current, as he had been in his 



170 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

earlier efforts. I swam back to try again and saw 
Mann carried around by the circling currents and 
finally go under not many feet from the waterfall. 
I do not feel certain whether he was diving for Warren 
or was sucked under by the whirlpool. He never 
came up. It was impossible for me to get into that 
pool with the strength I had left, and it was useless 
or worse than useless to be carried around by the 
whirling waters unless one had some idea where help 
was wanted. Hume and Kemp soon returned with a 
rope and Kemp with the rope about him dove into the 
pool below. None of us, even the rescue party, the 
next day, got into the upper pool, which grew worse 
as the rain continued later in the afternoon. The 
search party could only drag it and search it with 
poles while the waterfall was so heavy. It was nearly 
two hours, after Warren went under, that we gave up 
hope and Kemp started up the mountain for help. 
He left us at three-thirty o'clock and arrived at Kuling 
at five-thirty. Three men started back at seven 
o'clock, with ten coolies, dry clothing, food, etc. 
Meanwhile Hume and I had retired to a temple 
near by to get dry. The three men joined us there 
about midnight. A large party with ladders, ropes, 
grappling irons, etc., arrived at sunrise, and the 
search began. About four hours later Warren was 
found in the pool below the pot-hole where he fell in. 
Mann was found in the pool half an hour later. Both 



THE ACCIDENT 171 

were pulled up easily on ladders. Warren had on his 
running pants, shirt and pongee coat, 1 and Mann the 
underclothes which he had not taken off. They were 
carried up the mountain on stretchers, arriving before 
two o'clock. A host of friends here had made prepa- 
rations to receive them. They were buried together 
next morning at eight o'clock, after a beautiful out- 
door service conducted by the Rev. James Jackson, 
President of Boone College, of the Episcopal Mission, 
in Wuchang, and by Warren's classmate and room- 
mate, Rev. Gilbert Lovell, of the Presbyterian Mis- 
sion in Siangtan. 

(Signed) Brownell Gage." 

The heroic efforts of Arthur Mann to save War- 
ren's life, repeatedly plunging into the swirling pool 
and emerging but to plunge in again, reveal the mar- 
tyr spirit which swayed him. The utter self-sacrifice 
of this talented, well-equipped, promising Christian 
teacher to the Chinese fills all hearts with admiration. 
To Warren's home circle it brought an oppressive 
wave of the deepest gratitude, mingled with exquisite 
pain that one so noble in character, so indispensable 
to the work in China, should give his life in so chival- 
rous an effort to rescue a beloved son and brother. 

1 In other accounts of the accident it is told that when War- 
ren was found he lay with his hands clasped across his chest, his 
face wearing a peaceful expression. 



172 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

What can be finer in quality or breathe a choicer 
magnanimity than the words of Arthur Mann's fa- 
ther, Matthew D. Mann, M.D., of Buffalo, N. Y., 
in a letter to the writer of this sketch : " As regards 
Arthur's efforts to save Warren's life, we would not 
have had it otherwise. I would rather have had him 
dead than for him to have proven himself a coward ; 
such I know was his own spirit. He could not help 
doing all that was in his power." In Arthur Mann's 
noble deed were illustrated the words of our Lord : 
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man 
lay down his life for his friends." 

These two young men, in the vigor of early man- 
hood, engaged in a similar undertaking, the advance- 
ment of Christian education in China, finished their 
earthly service at almost the same moment. They 
were ushered as one soul into the presence of their 
God, one in their self-dedication to a sublime minis- 
try, at a great epoch in the unfolding of a mighty 
people, one in their humility, one in their spiritual 
valiancy. As in a sudden translation, they stood side 
by side before their King — and were not ashamed. 
Laying their commissions before Him, of labors al- 
ready finished, they were ready to be assigned to the 
new and infinitely higher mission to which they had 
been so swiftly summoned. 

Soon after the accident Professor Olin Wanna- 
maker of Canton composed these lines: — 



THE ACCIDENT 173 



WARREN SEABURY AND ARTHUR MANN 

(" They were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they 
were not divided.") 

They two went down the hills through a stormy dawn 
With joyous comrades, laughing in the mist, 
Cleaving the windy fog before their steps, 
And holding converse as they downward fared. 

The storm fog drenched their footing on the stones, 
The rains came roaring down the mountain streams, 
The torrent snatched them, — and they were no more. 

Their souls walked forth across the morning heights, 
And past the peaks and up beyond the clouds; 
So, while their brethren sought their bodies drowned, 
That loving hands might tomb them in the hills, 
Christ met them all amazed — in Paradise. 

In that perilous struggle to save the life of their 
friend and fellow-laborer nothing more could have 
been done than was done by Hume, Gage, and Kemp, 
facing the wild storm of that terrible afternoon. 
Breaking the news to the families at Kuling, the 
anxious night in the Buddhist temple, finding the 
bodies after the long search and bearing them up 
the mountain-side to the bungalow prepared for 
them, these and other incidents form a picture of 
inexpressible sadness, relieved only by the certainty 
that the " Eternal God is our Refuge." Nor can it ever 
be forgotten how anxious every one was to show his 
respect for the memory of the dead ; boys who loved 



174 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Warren gathered ferns from the mountain slopes, in 
the driving rain, and lined his grave with them, and 
other devoted hands covered the graves with flowers, 
bringing at short intervals fresh tokens, until the sea- 
son closed and they returned to their labors in the 
cities. Could Warren have expressed his choice it 
would no doubt have been : " Let me lie here among 
the people to whom I have given my life." There may 
his body rest, guarded by the bold and rugged moun- 
tains, while "the sentinel stars set their watch in the 
sky." To have separated Arthur Mann and Warren 
Seabury, in their final resting-place, would have done 
violence to the marvellous blending of their home- 
going. 

Not long after the burial, when the stricken colony 
had had time to recover from the shock of the tragic 
event, about thirty of Warren's friends met in the 
Yale bungalow for a service of remembrance. Some 
of his associates spoke of that phase of his life with 
which each was most familiar: Gilbert Lovell, his 
College and Seminary days ; Philip Evans, Northfield 
and his missionary purposes; Arthur Sherman, his 
winter at Hankow; Fleischer, his early months at 
Changsha ; Hume and Gage, his services to the Yale 
Mission; Edwin Lobenstine, spiritual impressions 
and lessons from his life. The hymns were those of 
which he was especially fond. 

The universal expressions of sorrow at Kuling were 




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THE ACCIDENT 175 

also manifest in many letters of sympathy from the 
various missionary boards represented there during 
that sad summer, and from those at their posts of 
duty at Changsha, Hankow, Wuchang, Shanghai, 
and other places. 

Hoyt was at Dalny when the news reached him. 
It came as an overwhelming blow to this dear friend 
of Warren's. It was more than his stricken heart 
could bear. Struggling to express himself, he wrote : 
" Never in my life before had any friend come to mean 
so much to me in every way, as had Warren in the 
year that I knew him. The whole aspect of my work 
and my life in Changsha was changed by our friend- 
ship and companionship. And I can't make the loss 
seem real yet. Death had never come very close to 
me before and I can't grasp it. I ought not to dwell so 
long on my own feelings, but I would like to have you 
know a little of all that Warren was to me. He always 
stood for the best and the highest and my great loss 
makes me want to reach out to you over the sea my 
best love and deepest sympathy." Early in Septem- 
ber Hoyt went back to his post of duty as teacher in 
the Shi-ya Government school at Changsha. He was 
then suffering from dysentery ; after many weeks of 
wasting illness heart failure brought this choice spirit 
his call to higher work. Hoyt and Seabury planned 
to live together the following year, for Warren used 
to say : " We can't get along without Ho." 



176 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Rev. H. Roswell Bates, who came to Kuling soon 
after the event, and who has, since his return to this 
country, used Warren's life as the text of many pow- 
erful addresses to students, writes as follows : " Early 
one morning while at Kuling I went out on a spur 
of a mountain which overhangs the valley, in search 
of his quiet resting-place. I knew the grave by the 
fresh cut flowers which were placed upon it and sat 
down to read my Bible for a little while and to think 
over his beautiful life. The more I think of him the 
more his friendship means to me. Surely he had 
' built his nest in the greatness of God ' and when the 
flood came which snatched his soul from his body 
it could not harm him, for he was with God and there, 
I am sure, he is finding a larger service than he could 
know in China. 

"The Chinese were greatly impressed at his fu- 
neral ; impressed for three reasons : first, because the 
Christians placed such emphasis upon the victory 
over death; second, because the Christians showed 
such love for him. Of course the Chinese do not re- 
gard death as a triumphal entry into eternal life, and 
the attitude shown by his warmest friends at the time 
of his death taught them the value of the Christian 
faith as no sermon could have done. Third, the Chi- 
nese know so little of what we call Brotherhood, that 
they kept saying to themselves in surprise, ' Why, 
their faith really makes them love each other ! ' ,! 



XII 

THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 

The daily press of July 30th gave the news of War- 
ren's death to his friends far and near. It brought to 
the family a flood of letters from his acquaintances, 
associates, classmates, and those who had passed 
through similar afflictions. They were significant and 
eloquent in the things they could not say, the emo- 
tions they could not express. 

On the twenty-first day of September a Memorial 
Service for him was held in the First Congregational 
Church of Wellesley Hills, a large company of his 
friends attending. The ushers were his classmates 
and old-time companions. Choice flowers were beau- 
tifully arranged by devoted friends. On the front of 
the pulpit were two wreaths, one bearing the letters 
"A. S. M.," the other, "W. B. S." The hymns sung 
were two of those used at the funeral at Kuling, also, 
" Crossing the Bar," a favorite with him, and " Some 
time we '11 understand." The programme contained 
several quotations from his letters, and a leaflet in 
memory of the sacrifice of Arthur Mann. Samuel B. 
Capen, LL.D., presided, representing the American 
Board. Addresses were made by Rev. Anson Phelps 
Stokes, Jr., representing Yale University; Rev. D. 



178 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

Brewer Eddy, of the Executive Committee of the 
Yale Mission in China; Professor M. W. Jacobus, 
D.D., of Hartford Theological Seminary ; Rev. Frank 
K. Sanders, D.D., instructor and friend; Bishop 
Roots of the American Episcopal Mission, Hankow, 
China, friend in the foreign field. Rev. W. B. Stos- 
kopf of the Church of the Advent, Boston, read the 
Scriptures. The prayer by Rev. John R. Thurston, 
D.D., father of the late Lawrence Thurston, flowed 
from a soul burdened by a kindred sorrow, but stead- 
fast in its faith in God. The words spoken came from 
the lips of men who loved Warren, and were marked 
by great discrimination, appropriateness, sympathy, 
and beauty. They disclosed his character from per- 
sonal knowledge of him as a student, a worker on the 
field, an intimate friend. He was brought to view in 
that innate and efficient harmony which he possessed, 
for in him no quality of supreme weight stood out 
conspicuously ; no power was kept in the shadow by 
another loftier than itself. His real charm lay in the 
quiet symmetry of all his gifts. His sense of humor, 
vivid as it was, blended with his promptness to see 
and feel the insistence of duty, the responsibility of 
stewardship, the realities of the future. Reverence in 
poise with pleasantry, firmness with gentleness, hu- 
mility with moral assertiveness, a passion of righteous 
indignation with patience and self-control, haste in 
doing the King's business with composure in biding 



THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 179 

the King's time, — these traits, in their interweaving, 
were characteristic of him, aiding him through two 
channels: One was his power of varied acquisition. 
He gathered from all sources ; he gave out with cor- 
responding lavishness, for no part of his acquisitive 
nature seems to have been dormant. The other was 
his power of concentration, — " the specialized con- 
trol of attention," ever arousing him to do many 
things and to do them well. The addresses, in their 
fine blending, emphasized this feature. 

His friend of earlier days, Rev. Mr. Eddy, said : 
"The very reason these rich memories crowd upon 
us is that Warren was such a splendid example of a 
real Christian. Few are the complete and rounded 
lives that seem to bear the impress of the Master's 
touch. We get accustomed to half-hearted service 
and to the combination of conviction with narrow- 
ness, but here we give praise for a life that held a full 
measure of the pleasures of Christian manhood. . . . 
I never knew a more unselfish man. What a wealth 
of tenderness he had for one in trouble ! and yet how 
fine were his strength and determination ! To the full 
and deep earnestness of Christian devotion Warren 
added an irresistible and infectious attractiveness 
that made his going to China seem a greater thing 
than for most men. Life will be the poorer for us 
if this experience does not lead us straight to the 
strength and inspiration that Warren knew so well." 



180 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

This blending of his powers Professor Jacobus 
brought out at the Memorial Service: "Warren's 
Seminary work was, first of all, full of the spirit of 
the life around him. The fraternity of the Seminary 
halls and Commons knew him at once. If it was the 
ball game, or tennis, or the winter sports, he was 
leader in them all. If it was the social hour or the 
formal reception, or the pleasantry of the student 
function, he was at the front in each of them and 
was indispensable to its success. For he was whole- 
hearted in his enthusiasm just as he was whole- 
handed in his service. He liked the fun of life. He 
enjoyed the humor of life. He revelled in the exercise 
of life. He gave himself to life, just for the simple, 
wholesome, red-blooded, pure-minded, noble-hearted 
living of it. And of course this infected others' living. 
It cleared the cobwebs out of others' brains, it started 
the sluggishness out of others' veins. It got others 
who knew books to get acquainted with the vagrant 
winds of heaven, companionable with the color and 
the music of God's great world and brought them to 
know each other and themselves in that living where 
* men register their interests by what they do and say 
and let their minds have play upon.' 

" This dear soul was not exempt from struggle. He 
was not free from question and debate. How deep 
these were and how vitally they laid hold of him, per- 
haps none of us shall ever know ; for this reserve kept 



THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 181 

him from the uncovering of his inner self in the class- 
room, and made distasteful to him any boisterous 
airing of himself even within the rooms where friend 
and friend held communion with one another. But I 
believe few men within the Seminary life ever dealt 
more bravely with the questions which that life sum- 
mons before the soul ; for these questions were to him 
the questions which determined what he himself 
should believe, as he went out into the dark world of 
Christless China and sought to lead it to God. He 
must have a word to speak which was real to him, or 
he could not make it real to those poor souls. He must 
know God, or he could not make God known. He 
must in some way understand for himself the great 
love of Jesus of Nazareth, as it wrought itself into 
that ministry in Galilee and that passion on Calvary, 
or he could not hope ever to make it understood. It 
was his intense conviction that he must get at these 
things in their actuality for himself that perhaps left 
him at points confused in mind as he came to the end 
of his course, but it was just this same conviction 
that, when he got across the wide waters, heart to 
heart with his work, showed him how much after all 
he had found of what he had sought for. And the 
treasure he had purchased at such cost he poured 
out with a far richer offering than if he had never 
struggled for it at all. The Saviour he gave to others 
was a far greater Saviour, because he had so become 



182 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

to be the Saviour of his own soul. The Master he 
preached to others was a far more royal Master, 
because he had so come to hold the mastery over his 
own living. And so it matters little that the service 
he gave was short in its duration ; for it was a service 
into which he threw all he had gathered out of these 
deep experiences of his life and all that these experi- 
ences had brought him in himself to be." 

The letters which came from China after his death 
referred repeatedly to this well-rounded feature of his 
character. Gage, who knew him intimately, writes : 
" I often think of Warren's devotion, which is in itself 
a cumulative inference, and, as far as examples go, 
is best shown by such large things as his two summers 
spent in the hot city. I remember coming in and catch- 
ing him unawares that first summer (1905), before he 
thought Hume and I could arrive. We were in the 
excitement engendered by the hope of getting land. 
I found him at his table, which had been moved 
into the court for the sake of coolness, poring over 
a lot of Chinese characters which he was trying to 
learn. ... It was evident that the Chinese had a 
fondness for him because of his good nature and his 
patience combined with his personal ways, but the 
Chinese are stolid about their deepest feelings." In 
giving a resume of Warren's qualities, which he con- 
sidered he possessed to a marked degree, Gage adds : 
"I should name as most prominent and important 



THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 183 

these characteristics in Warren which are essential 
to success : 1. Robust health and absence of * nerves.' 
2. Cheerfulness and a keen sense of humor. 3. Pa- 
tience and perfect good nature with exasperating 
people and circumstances. 4. Enthusiasm, earnest- 
ness and force of character. 5. Entire freedom from 
gossip and the tendency to talk over the weaknesses 
of others. 6. Good sense and willingness to learn, 
to change his mind and to take advice and receive 
suggestions, although they might oppose his previous 
views." 

His capacity for friendship appeared in Bishop 
Roots 's words at the Memorial Service : " The most 
precious thing about Seabury's life, to those who 
knew him in China, is the friendship he called out 
from the Chinese. He learned the language, I think, 
distinctly better than most young missionaries learn 
it; but there was something besides his ability to 
speak their language which gave him access to the 
hearts of the Chinese. It has been most truly said 
that Orientals think a great deal more about what you 
do than about what you say. They judge what you 
mean not by your words but by your deeds, and it 
was the constant manifestation of intelligent sympa- 
thy and kindliness, in all of his relations, which won 
for Seabury the confidence of the Chinese. Two of 
our Chinese clergymen, stationed in Changsha during 
Seabury's residence there, leaned upon him as I have 



184 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

never known them to lean on any other person not a 
member of our own Mission. It comes a little hard to 
say he was not a member of our Mission, for we re- 
garded him as belonging to us, just as I think other 
missions regarded him as belonging to them, and our 
Chinese workers felt as we did about him. They went 
to him freely, especially when beset by the perplexing 
dangers incident to the political unrest in China ; and 
his counsel was given freely in such ways as to brace 
them for all the work they had to do." 

Confirming this prevailing trait, a dear friend says : 
" What a flood of memories come back to me, where 
that throbbing and earnest heart figured in my life ! 
The distress I was in for years made me know how 
big a heart, and how sympathetic, he had. I never 
knew a man whose naturally joyous mood and face 
would change so quickly on an appeal for friendly 
sympathy, or whose affectionate interest could have 
followed as his did the blind gropings on my part for 
peace. I recall my last look at him ; he had driven me 
down to the station at Wellesley Hills and as the train 
moved out he stood on the depot platform ; knowing 
the darkness and uncertainty that was on my heart 
and when his voice could no longer reach me, he 
stood with his arm raised, his finger pointing up- 
wards." This further appears in the testimony of 
Professor F. Wells Williams, a member of the Execu- 
tive Committee of the Yale Mission, who writes: 



THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 185 

"He had a charm such as few possess to win and 
keep friends and a strength which does not often go 
with such amiability. To these qualities we owe the 
successful deal that gave us our college buildings at 
Changsha, the securing of which will stand as his 
monument as long as the Mission endures, and seems 
to have been deemed, by a higher Power than we 
can comprehend, sufficient to secure him an eternal 
reward." 

The work in China brought Warren face to face 
with an exacting test of his power of administration. 
To have a share in laying the foundation of an insti- 
tution which should have in it the prophecy of years, 
a far-reaching influence to be slowly and wisely de- 
veloped, demanded the finest executive talent. The 
Yale Mission College must become a foremost factor 
in the educational conquests of the Empire ; therefore 
the initial hours must be long hours and all work 
thoroughly done. No violence should be shown a 
people endowed beyond all other Asiatics with the 
" historic instinct." Such social and intellectual seg- 
regation as theirs, which has contributed to their 
marvellous solidarity, must permit the entrance of a 
new instinct for civilization. In the vast crisis of 
change from the old to the new, great wisdom is 
needed in meeting the temper of the Chinese mind. 
Those who watched Warren in the days when he be- 
gan, with his associates, the subsoil work of 1905-6-7, 



186 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

felt how judicious and unprejudiced he was in his 
share of the work of that crucial period. He grew 
in the art of reaching men. 

In the resolution passed by the Yale Mission's 
Executive Committee his administrative ability is 
thus referred to : — 

" Warren Bartlett Seabury was one of the first men 
who grasped the possibilities of the Yale Mission in 
China. From his college days, on through all the long 
years of preparation, he had his mind fixed on the 
work of Christ in the Far East. He had a clear reali- 
zation of the needs of China and of the great future 
that lies before that country, when the teachings of 
Christianity shall have gained a firm footing there. 
To the task of aiding in this great work of regenera- 
tion through Christian education he devoted himself 
with tact, patience, energy, courage and faith. He 
had the supreme satisfaction of knowing that it was 
mainly due to his labors that the Yale Mission secured 
premises for the beginning of its work in Changsha, 
and that it was largely due to him that the Collegiate 
School completed its first year under such good aus- 
pices. The Executive Committee had grown to real- 
ize that Warren Seabury's humble and strong charac- 
ter, his sound judgment, cheerful personality, and 
true loyalty to his Master were among its most valued 
assets, and feels that in his death the Mission has sus- 
tained an irreparable loss, for which it would express 



THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 187 

to his family at home and his co-workers in China its 
deepest sympathy." 

And will some one ask, " Why sacrifice to vast and 
unwieldy China youthful powers which might have 
been so effectively given to progressive America?" 
The thrilling answer comes out of the mighty crisis in 
the China of to-day, an opportune China, an aroused 
and eager China. How the words ring out in this our 
swift-winged age : A transformed China ! A China 
without foot-binding, without opium-slaves, without 
bondage to ancestral worship, without prejudice 
against Christian institutions ! What a glorious mis- 
sion opens here for a young man, at this the twelfth 
stroke in the sweep of time ! Projecting one's self into 
this golden epoch of the new century is itself the seal 
of victory. 

Moved by the mighty summons, Warren Seabury 
pledged himself to surrender in service what he had 
cherished in vision. He felt it was the ripe hour for 
the investment of the best talent of American youth, 
in moulding the China of the future. Although far 
within the horizon of his ambition, he gave himself to 
his life's work there, in that country opening her 
rusty gates to Western thought. He made a deliber- 
ate choice, and he ever kept to his high purpose to 
serve God in China. When his work was finished he 
was called from it to another part of the Kingdom. 
Lawrence Thurston gave only eleven months to 



188 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

China, Warren three times as many. In this, to us, 
short period, God's plan for him in China was abun- 
dantly carried out. In that estimate, which is our 
great resource, Warren lived a completed life. The 
increase of years in that inviting field would not have 
added one laurel to his brow, if the Sovereign of the 
whole Kingdom wished him in another portion. As a 
Connecticut pastor writes : " Many a time I have said 
as I have watched him, * This young man is destined 
to be a great missionary.' He had, in a preeminent 
sense, the equipment for great service in China. He 
seemed the ideal man for this formative period, and 
I now recall the words of Phillips Brooks, that 'the 
Master must have vast resources in men and means 
to withdraw a life like this.' I think of the Mission's 
sad bereavement and irreparable loss and of the sore 
disappointment and the inexpressible sorrow of the 
Wellesley Hills home, — and then realize that only 
the Father can interpret this providence and only the 
Master can make all things clear." 

To reduce to concrete form the results of Warren's 
work is utterly futile; much of it lies hidden in the 
foundation-laying done with so much prayerful at- 
tention to little details, of which only the Eye of 
God makes account. But there are visible tokens of 
his labors that will stand the test of time. He applied 
himself persistently to the acquisition of that most 
difficult language and after a year's study preached 



THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 189 

in it, although brokenly ; he won the confidence of the 
wary Chinese ; more than this, he called forth their 
love. In a land where things endure, he made a dis- 
tinct contribution to the building of a great Institu- 
tion, destined to become a part of the life of a country, 
where longevity is a racial and a social trait. By his 
industrious hand much of the initial sacrifice was 
made; as in the erection of some vast cathedral, he 
devotedly set some of the basal stones in their places. 
In the task of inaugurating the work itself, Warren 
was first on Changsha soil. In alliance with Hume 
and Gage he laid out the courses of study, the rules 
and regulations for the management of the school. 
It fell to his lot to discover, purchase, and transform 
the house now used for school purposes. He pio- 
neered much of the early administration of the School ; 
he shared with his associates the gathering of stu- 
dents, taught in the class-room the first year and saw 
that year completed. Is not this worth going to China 
for ? Is it not worthy the name of Him Who gave him 
his original commission, to go forth and teach in His 
name ? Do we wonder that the seal of the Master 
is already on his labors? Are we surprised at the 
testimonies already given of the fruits of his efforts 
to do exact and timely work, in that field with so 
wonderful an outlook? 

Into all that touches the present hour of the Yale 
of China the labors of Warren Seabury are closely 



190 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

woven and he lives in her now. With this in view Mr. 
Stokes's words may well be remembered : " It is given 
to few men to accomplish in a life-time what Warren 
did in a few short years. It was given him to be one 
of the founders of a great Institution ; he did his work 
humbly, in the spirit of Christ. His influence will be 
great among us all. He was a Christian gentleman, 
a true missionary, one of the noblest fellows I ever 
met." 

Mr. Amos P. Wilder, visiting Changsha early in 
the year following the accident, writes to the " Yale 
Alumni Weekly : " " Memories of Thurston and Sea- 
bury are constant and bracing rather than sad. . . . 
Yale men visiting China should push past modern 
China to Changsha, where one may see the Empire 
as it is. A cordial welcome awaits him at the School. 
There are music and flowers, pleasantry and good 
talk, and in the dormitories not far away one can 
hear twoscore of young Chinese of good family sing- 
ing snatches of native songs and talking of new 
things. Some day there will be five hundred, and 
then a thousand, and Yale will mean even more at 
Peking and in the seats of the mighty, and the old 
saints and sages in Yale's coronation list will lie si- 
lent in their graves, as if this potential thing did not 
trace back to their dreams and their faith. Arthur 
Smith is right, when he says of this new College 
in China : * It is the greatest opportunity any uni- 



THE MEMORIAL SERVICE 191 

versity ever had for doing a matchless work for hu- 
manity.' " 

As this broad educational system unfolds, so fasci- 
nating and so prophetic of mighty things, others will 
bring their glowing testimony to the commanding ser- 
vice of her teachers, foreign and native. They will look 
upon a great University equipped in all departments, 
in classics, mathematics, literature, science, art, medi- 
cine, law, theology. She will have a worthy plant, 
her buildings ample and fitted to their uses and to the 
demands of the age. Her scholarships will be a stim- 
ulus to her eager and competitive ambition ; her inter- 
class and intercollegiate contests will cover oratory 
and athletics. Her campus will be a rallying centre 
for her many students. She will have her college 
songs, her college colors, her college cheer, and each 
will be characteristic and inspiring. A religious spirit 
will not be lacking, but will crystallize in her Christian 
Association building, in her roll of " Student Volun- 
teers " for regions beyond. As the years sweep on and 
commencement succeeds commencement, she will 
produce a noble army of alumni, in the foremost 
rank of China's educators and public servants, who 
will return to do honor to their Alma Mater. All this 
is no idle dream, for the older Yale is behind her, 
devoted builders are still at work on the foundations, 
a great price has already been paid for her freedom 
in the sacrifice of those who have laid down their 



192 THE VISION OF A SHORT LIFE 

lives in her behalf, men who believed that her su- 
premacy, her redemption, is drawing near. 

When that coveted, that sublime day dawns, 
Warren Seabury's vision of a Christian University 
in Central China will be fully realized. 



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